David Lynch, the visionary director who created unforgettable films revealing darker realms of life such as "Elephant Man" and "Blue Velvet" and who brought to mainstream TV a deeper aesthetic and consciousness with the "Twin Peaks" series, unfortunately went overboard with "Inland Empire" writing and directing the worst film of his career.
"Inland Empire" is arguably Lynch's most ambitious effort: a meandering three-hour dive into a nightmarish dream world where all his previous themes and obsessions convey. There are enslaved women (Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks), women in trouble (Mulholland Drive), supernatural entities in other realms (Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive), dissociative fugues and alternative realities (Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive). As expected of a Lynch movie, the cast is top notch starting with Laura Dern and it even includes Jeremy Irons as a movie director. But the direction and the script fail to give us something of depth or a remotely compelling, entertaining story, therefore this Lynchean nightmare becomes endless, pointless, and ultimately boring. Each shot of dreary,dilapidated Polish buildings or empty and dark Hollywood sets become endless. Every time the character are hurting or menacing, the camera does a close-up distorting their faces or they behave histrionically as in the worst of the Mexican telenovelas. This is simply poor direction. These close-ups and long shots, among other cinematic pyrotechnics, are Lynch's filler to disguise the emptiness of "Inland Empire," Although both films are similar in plot and style, "Inland Empire" suffers compared to "Mulholland Drive." Lynch deserved the Oscar for that brilliant film which is memorable for its character development along a dark psychic ride, elements that are missing in "Inland Empire" replaced by a cheap thrills posing for art and profundity.
The plot is vintage Lynch, but it is the most convoluted, longest, and silliest of them all. Lost Girl, an enslaved woman in Polish hotel/purgatory watches shows on a psychic TV: a sitcom with supernatural rabbit people, scenes from a Polish film that never got finished because the leading actors were murdered, and the life of an American actress who starts in the remake of the Polish film. Nikki (Laura Dern), the actress, begins an affair with her leading man and freaks out entering an alternative reality becoming Sue, the white trash character she is playing in the movie. Sue is having an extramarital affair with Billy, a rich man, and lives with Smithy in the house of the movie set. Sue is psychically connected to enslaved prostitutes who teletransport themselves from the snowy streets of Poland in the 1940s to present day Hollywood Boulevard. The prostitutes talk about men, love, and T&A and suddenly burst into dance for no reason - they do a killer number with "The Loco-Motion" which is unfortunately too short. Sue's husband, Smithy, who is Polish, leaves for Poland to work with a circus. Sue goes to see Billy and Billy's wife beats her. Sue becomes a whore working Hollywood Boulevard with the dance-loving, space/time-jumping whores. The Phantom, an evil supernatural man who has Lost Girl enslaved in purgatory, kills an early incarnation of Smithy who was Lost Girl's lover. The Phantom hypnotizes Billy's wife who is the reincarnation of a Polish woman who was stabbed to death with a screwdriver by the original actress in the Polish movie. The rabbit people are also wise, older Polish men and have a séance with Lost Girl and they bring Smithy to talk to Lost Girl. The old men give a gun to Smithy to kill the Phantom. Sue gets stabbed with a screwdriver on Hollywood Blvd. by Billy's wife and dies. That is the end of the movie and it is a wrap. Nikki is congratulated by the director but she ignores everybody and walks away from the movie set remaining as Sue. She goes to the house where she finds the gun Smithy was given by the old men. She goes through some dark corridors and finds herself in the Polish hotel/purgatory where the Phantom is and as she shoots him his face becomes Sue's own distorted face. The Phantom dies and all the women are free and Lost Girl reunites with Smithy and her son. Then Nikki is back in her home and all the women have a big a party and some women shake their booties to a Nina Simone song. They are in a kind of good place, not purgatory. It is not clear whether Nikki/Sue was an invention of Lost Girl who had been the real murderer and was in purgatory or whatever; in the final analysis, it does not matter because the movie is empty and lacks any redemptive qualities.
It is hard to understand why some of the critics and audience fail to realize that this is a very bad film, poorly written and badly directed. Lynch is a true artist and has done some remarkable films for which he should be praised, alas, "Inland Empire" is a disjointed, tedious, nonsense mess filled with pretentiousness. If you want to waste three hours of your life with a superficial mind-tease filled with pseudo transpersonal psychology and collective unconscious references, see it at your own risk.
"Inland Empire" is arguably Lynch's most ambitious effort: a meandering three-hour dive into a nightmarish dream world where all his previous themes and obsessions convey. There are enslaved women (Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks), women in trouble (Mulholland Drive), supernatural entities in other realms (Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive), dissociative fugues and alternative realities (Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive). As expected of a Lynch movie, the cast is top notch starting with Laura Dern and it even includes Jeremy Irons as a movie director. But the direction and the script fail to give us something of depth or a remotely compelling, entertaining story, therefore this Lynchean nightmare becomes endless, pointless, and ultimately boring. Each shot of dreary,dilapidated Polish buildings or empty and dark Hollywood sets become endless. Every time the character are hurting or menacing, the camera does a close-up distorting their faces or they behave histrionically as in the worst of the Mexican telenovelas. This is simply poor direction. These close-ups and long shots, among other cinematic pyrotechnics, are Lynch's filler to disguise the emptiness of "Inland Empire," Although both films are similar in plot and style, "Inland Empire" suffers compared to "Mulholland Drive." Lynch deserved the Oscar for that brilliant film which is memorable for its character development along a dark psychic ride, elements that are missing in "Inland Empire" replaced by a cheap thrills posing for art and profundity.
The plot is vintage Lynch, but it is the most convoluted, longest, and silliest of them all. Lost Girl, an enslaved woman in Polish hotel/purgatory watches shows on a psychic TV: a sitcom with supernatural rabbit people, scenes from a Polish film that never got finished because the leading actors were murdered, and the life of an American actress who starts in the remake of the Polish film. Nikki (Laura Dern), the actress, begins an affair with her leading man and freaks out entering an alternative reality becoming Sue, the white trash character she is playing in the movie. Sue is having an extramarital affair with Billy, a rich man, and lives with Smithy in the house of the movie set. Sue is psychically connected to enslaved prostitutes who teletransport themselves from the snowy streets of Poland in the 1940s to present day Hollywood Boulevard. The prostitutes talk about men, love, and T&A and suddenly burst into dance for no reason - they do a killer number with "The Loco-Motion" which is unfortunately too short. Sue's husband, Smithy, who is Polish, leaves for Poland to work with a circus. Sue goes to see Billy and Billy's wife beats her. Sue becomes a whore working Hollywood Boulevard with the dance-loving, space/time-jumping whores. The Phantom, an evil supernatural man who has Lost Girl enslaved in purgatory, kills an early incarnation of Smithy who was Lost Girl's lover. The Phantom hypnotizes Billy's wife who is the reincarnation of a Polish woman who was stabbed to death with a screwdriver by the original actress in the Polish movie. The rabbit people are also wise, older Polish men and have a séance with Lost Girl and they bring Smithy to talk to Lost Girl. The old men give a gun to Smithy to kill the Phantom. Sue gets stabbed with a screwdriver on Hollywood Blvd. by Billy's wife and dies. That is the end of the movie and it is a wrap. Nikki is congratulated by the director but she ignores everybody and walks away from the movie set remaining as Sue. She goes to the house where she finds the gun Smithy was given by the old men. She goes through some dark corridors and finds herself in the Polish hotel/purgatory where the Phantom is and as she shoots him his face becomes Sue's own distorted face. The Phantom dies and all the women are free and Lost Girl reunites with Smithy and her son. Then Nikki is back in her home and all the women have a big a party and some women shake their booties to a Nina Simone song. They are in a kind of good place, not purgatory. It is not clear whether Nikki/Sue was an invention of Lost Girl who had been the real murderer and was in purgatory or whatever; in the final analysis, it does not matter because the movie is empty and lacks any redemptive qualities.
It is hard to understand why some of the critics and audience fail to realize that this is a very bad film, poorly written and badly directed. Lynch is a true artist and has done some remarkable films for which he should be praised, alas, "Inland Empire" is a disjointed, tedious, nonsense mess filled with pretentiousness. If you want to waste three hours of your life with a superficial mind-tease filled with pseudo transpersonal psychology and collective unconscious references, see it at your own risk.