Earlier this month, filmmaker David Lynch was speaking at his Festival of Disruption, when the topic of social media was brought up. As you might imagine, if you’re familiar with Lynch, he’s not the biggest fan of the social media landscape, especially when it comes to film.
He began by talking about people’s newfound need to let the world know exactly what they think of a movie, once they watch it. “You finish a film these days and right away you have this pressure to write about it in words,” Lynch said (via IndieWire). “Unless you’re a poet, words will fail you.”
As film fans, and readers of The Playlist, it’s safe to say that your social media feeds are overrun with friends and family’s hot takes regarding the latest film released. And to speak to Lynch’s point, most of those takes consist of “OMG, it was SOOOOO good!!!” or something equally as eloquent. Needless to say, it’s highly unlikely that the next Roger Ebert is on your Twitter feed.
When the conversation turned to Lynch’s interests, that’s when the filmmaker truly surprised the crowd. He was asked what his current pop culture obsessions are, if any. “I’m interested in painting right now,” Lynch said. “I watch some crime shows and I watch Velocity channel. I love to watch people build and customize cars.”
Finally, Lynch talked a little about success. Most recently, the director released a new series of “Twin Peaks” to great fanfare. So, at the moment, Lynch is definitely experiencing a new level of success. But that doesn’t mean he likes it. “Success is dangerous. Failure gives you freedom because you have nowhere to go but up. That’s a beautiful feeling. Success is nice, but work is work and success gets in the way of making work,” explained the director.
So, what have we learned? Lynch doesn’t think your social media film reviews are good, he likes cars, and he is just as obsessed with crime shows as everyone else is at the moment.
