Eraserhead (1977) Review
THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
You ever have one of those times in your life where you ask yourself what hell is going on? That’s what I went through watching David Lynch’s directorial debut Eraserhead.
PLOT
The 1977 takes place in a dystopian wasteland and follows a man named Henry Spencer who works as a printer at LaPell’s Factory. When walking home to his apartment full of dead plants, he gets informed by one of his neighbors that he’s been invited to dinner by his girlfriend Mary, along with her parents Mr. and Mrs. X (Allen Joseph & Jeanne Bates). It is during said dinner where he would given the news that he conceived a premature infant with Mary and her mother insists they should now that they have a child together. As Henry is overwhelmed with a nose bleed, Mary isn’t even sure if it is a baby due to appearing swaddled in a bundle of bandages with only an inhuman face sticking out in the shape of spermatozoon. Moving into Henry’s apartment does not become any easier for Mary that the baby constantly cries and refuses to eat. When she chooses to leave back home hoping to get some sleep, Henry would discover the baby to develop painful sores and it struggles to breathe, hence being so difficult to feed. Having seen past visions of a man flushing a creature that would resemble his child, he has a new one where he sees said man and a lady inhabit his radiator before stomping on more creatures that resemble his baby. When being intimate with his neighbor across the hall (Judith Anna Roberts), his next vision would involve him losing his head that gets replaced by his baby’s and is later found to be turned into an eraser. When Henry seeks his neighbor again, he’d be heartbroken seeing her with another guy and chooses to remove his baby’s bandages, revealing it has no skin and has been containing its organs like so. When stabbing the organs with scissors, a thick liquid emerges and the child would grow to the point of planet sized. The film would end with Henry entering a white void where he’d get to embrace the same singing woman (Laurel Near) in his vision.
THOUGHTS
Every time a new director makes their theatric debut, each one has to find a trademark that’ll make them stand out from the rest. Lynch was aware of this and ended up creating one of the most experimental & unorthodox experiences, the first of many from him. Eraserhead is one of those movies that cling onto you forever because of what can be said with so little to know. It’s openly strange with everything that transpires given this takes place in another planet. Lynch’s editing along with the cinematography efforts by Frederick Elmes & Herbert Cardwell make the story so surreal that you don’t want to look away. I mean it’s not everyday you can envision a lady with swollen cheeks singing ‘In Heaven’. That alone is great makeup by Lynch as well, who would even be involved in crafting the baby he nicknamed Spike. That baby truly is the stuff of nightmares to the point where I get why many deem this to be a horror flick. I would simply identify it as science fiction for the whole situation being unreal to witness. It makes sense for it to have such a disturbing birth defect given it was born in a wasteland. I think the reason people keep thinking about this film and respecting it dearly has to be because it’s Lynch’s own allegory addressing the weight of responsibility and in this case, when it comes to settling down to parenthood. Through Jack Nance’s lead performance, Henry is a guy who lacks assertiveness when it comes to want to take control in his life. The way he doesn’t try hard enough to speak for himself leads to a giant case of entrapment. It’s very obvious he doesn’t really love Mary if Charlotte Stewart is portraying her to be quite resentful towards everyone around her. It is one thing to admit the pressure in taking care of a child that has a birth defect, but walking away like she did does not solve a damn thing. Was it really the right thing for Henry to euthanize his baby? I would say yes and no because while he mostly does it for himself to continue living a bit freely again, he knows he doesn’t want it to keep suffering given that it doesn’t have a normal body. Will he truly be happy with the singing lady now that he freed himself from entrapment? That’ll be up to him on what can come next should there still be a world left after what’s been done. In short, Eraserhead is a psychedelic experience of a movie that’ll never leave your mind once seen. If you seek an acid trip of a movie to watch at midnight, this one will do it for you.
Comments