Unless you’re a silly goose who counts “Twin Peaks: The Return” as a movie, “Inland Empire” is, as of this writing, the last film David Lynch directed. There will always be hope that Lynch will return with a new movie, but as of now that doesn’t seem likely. Which means “Inland Empire” holds a special place in Lynch’s one-of-a-kind filmography. “Weird” and “confusing” are words that get thrown around a lot when people are talking about Lynch’s work, but truth be told, I’ve never found his work all that inaccessible. Yes, it’s often strange and scary, but I can almost always figure out what’s going on. That’s not the case for “Inland Empire,” which is a work so impenetrable that even the actors in the film don’t really know what it’s all about.
Lynch’s muse Laura Dern plays an actress who takes on a new film role and then promptly tumbles down into a world of surreal horror. Featuring giant anthropomorphic rabbit people, a chorus of women who dance around to “The Loco-Motion,” and some special effects that are crude yet horrifying, “Inland Empire” unfolds somewhere at the intersection of fantasy and nightmare. It’s Lynch’s first film shot on digital, and he doesn’t try to make the digital cinematography look like film — it’s often grainy, and rough, and crude, which only adds to the ghoulish nature of what’s unfolding on the screen.
Special features:
- New HD digital master, made from the 4K restoration supervised by director David Lynch, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio and uncompressed stereo soundtracks, newly remastered by Lynch and original rerecording mixers Dean Hurley and Ron Eng
- Two films from 2007, LYNCH (one) and LYNCH2, by blackANDwhite, the makers of David Lynch: The Art Life
- New conversation between actors Laura Dern and Kyle MacLachlan
- More Things That Happened, seventy-five minutes of extra scenes
- Ballerina, a 2007 short film by Lynch
- Reading by Lynch of excerpts from Room to Dream, his 2018 book with critic Kristine McKenna
- Trailer
- New English subtitle translation and English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- PLUS: Excerpts from Richard A. Barney’s book David Lynch: Interviews
