Eraserhead (35mm) + Asparagus

Rest in peace, David

Preceded by Suzan Pitt’s Asparagus (1979)

David Lynch once described his stunning debut feature simply as “a dream of dark and troubling things,” but the unclassifiable ERASERHEAD is so much more: an expressionistic headtrip, a Grand Guignol nightmare, a pitch-black comedy of manners, and even a deeply personal allegory about the (post-) nuclear family. Amidst a monochromatic wasteland teeming with smoke and shadows, Jack Nance’s wire-haired wage slave Henry struggles to navigate the horrors of mutant offspring, sinister hallucinations and, most terrifying of all, his new in-laws.

Preceding Eraserhead is Suzan Pitt’s Asparagus (1979), a wildly surreal animated hallucination that originally played before Lynch’s feature during its nearly two-year midnight movie run. A landmark of avant-garde animation, Pitt’s dreamlike short unfolds as a mesmerizing, wordless odyssey through rich, shifting landscapes, bridging the darkly poetic worlds of both filmmakers. USA, 1979, 20 min, DCP.

Part of In Dreams: A Tribute to David Lynch.