Err, we hope. According to David Lynch, Inland Empire makes total, logical sense. Most watchers make beg to differ, having experienced three hours of the most extreme Lynchian madness ever. After a second viewing our writer Damon Wise awoke in the middle of the night, convinced he had deciphered the film. Read on for our solution. Feel free to differ... WORDS: Damon Wise
Warning: Super Spoilers Below!
We think...
Nicky Grace, played by Laura Dern receives a premoniation early in the film.
The whole film is a premonition that Nicky Grace has. She's a successful actress but hasn't worked for a while, and the fact that she has to wait to find out whether she's got the part in On High On Blue Tomorrows or not suggests she's not A-list any more. In that sense, Mulholland Drive was about a failed starlet who is eaten up by her weaknesses and insecurities and Inland Empire is about a fading star who fights to beat them.
So the first part of the film consists of two mental barriers that she puts up for herself, the first being that she might have an affair with her co-star, who has a bad reputation, and the second being that the project is cursed and will finish her career. But she makes the film anyway and her determination to get back on top as a major star again causes her to get so far into character that her own life becomes confused, not only with the character she's playing but her whole acting process as she tries to 'find' the character of Susan, who is clearly a reach as she is totally unlike her.
As she struggles to become Susan, she goes through a number of transformations that become more and more raw, real and grubby. When she seems confused, I don't think it's a question of her not knowing who or where she is any more, it's just that she is constantly trying to find her audience, which is why she keeps asking (always other women) "Do you know who I am?" or "Do you recognise me?" She's asking them if they identify with her (ie: has she got the part right yet?) and sometimes they just say, "We will try" (meaning she hasn't).
The actual story of the film she's in is not really revealed, but appears to be about a woman having an affair with a married man.
The actual story of the film she's in is not really revealed, but appears to be about a woman having an affair with a married man. At the beginning, a voice mentions a "long-running serial", and the film itself (not the film within the film) appears to be saying that infidelity is an old, old story, going back hundreds of years, all over the world, and this is reflected in all the various permutations of husbands killing their wives, wives killing their husbands and and wives killing the competition (all those cigarette burns, usually in silk clothing, may well be a sort of a metaphor for a knife wound or a bullet hole). In every social situation it's the same, upper class or lower class and the fact that her husband comes from Poland is probably the reason which she chooses to imagine herself there.
By the end of the film-within-the-film she's completely nailed the part, and fact that she blends in, unnoticed, with the Japanese girl and the street boy means that she's gone as far as she can go, so when the film wraps, she no longer seems to know who or where she is, because it's all gone into the part. Trying to find reality, she confronts her demons in Room 47 (the Polish title of the original story), kills them, and goes to meet her audience, the woman crying in front of the TV. Nicky then vanishes, because her work is done.
The crying woman goes down to meet her husband, who it turns out is not a wife beater after all, and her son, who is alive. It seems Nicky has been providing a valuable service to this woman, taking elements of her life and taking her on an emotional journey that she can relate to but does not reflect the way things are for her exactly. However, it's real enough for her to be moved.
So, in a nutshell, the film is about an actress overcoming her fears.
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I think Lynch deals in the bigger picture. There are elements throughout his work (but especially in INLAND EMPIRE) that just don't seem to have specific meaning, but contribute to a message on a broader scale, for example: Eraserhead could be read as a comment on the fears of fatherhood, or Mulholland Dr being about the creation and destruction of dreams. Every frame doesn't necessarily have to be filled with meaning, but they support the tone of the film (atmospherically and thematically), so... Read More dead man
Did anyone else think that Inland Empire was a film about the experience of watching and engaging with a movie, TV show, radio serial, whatever. . . I felt as though I'd been hypnotised after watching it - and perhaps that was the point too. . . Incredible work Mr Lynch. ... Read More sarahc
This was a good read and certainly seems to be part of what the film is about. But where do the rabbits in that room fit into this theory? ... Read More drtyepic
Okay here it goes BUT this is what I think happened and it also fits which is the beauty of lynch. The polish woman at the beginning and end is depressed because her husband has left her and in order to combat this grief she does nothing but watch the television and who is dominating the television at this moment? Nikki a fading actress who is making her comeback so they're showing old films of hers and gossip shows also shows like Rabbits and it's mixing in this Womans head (this why Nikky chan... Read More morbo_evil
I’ve only seen it once, so this could all be cobblers but here I go. Got 2 slightly different ‘interpretations’ one more hopeful, one more bleak. Hopeful first…
The story is already over before the film begins (the opening shots of a record being played echo the ‘this is a recording’ stuff from Mulholland Drive). So, the story does have a beginning and an end, we just have to suss out where they are in the film…
The main character (for want of a better term) is the woman w... Read More jobloffski
Just thought: The girl who is "saved" by Laura Dern's performance is also watching Rabbits when she's so upset earlier in the film. Rabbits seemed to have the same feeling as Lynch's comic-strip "The Angriest Dog in the World" (in this movie at least), which is surely a reaction to the banal and mundane? The canned laughter in Rabbits evokes a sit-com feel, so maybe it's supposed to be saying that watching sit-coms is just as relevant to your life and useful to solving your p... Read More JohnnyWalker2001
I like your idea, I think it just about covers everything. The scene at the end, where she's hanging around with the characters from the film, seems to suggest she finally comes to peace with the experience and the characters in her head, and can co-exist peacefully with them. The Polish link surely comes from Grace Zabrinkski's premonition, though? Unless you're saying that the premonition was just a dream/her fears, then I suppose it would come from her husband.
It's weird that such a night... Read More JohnnyWalker2001
Unusually for me, I don't even want to try and sum up this Lynchfest yet.
I don't know if anybody came up with this point yet, though?
Are the Rabbits characters from other Lynch films trapped in 'Hell'?
The one one doing the ironing seems to be wearing Diane's dressing gown from 'Drive one appearing to be wearing Henry's suit from E'head. Don't know about the other one, but the rabbit in Alice in wonderland was 'late' so is this a joke on late, as in 'dead'?
... Read More jobloffski
I don't see the audience part of the film, i never thought they were her audience, i figured they were just different versions of her, and what she was trying to be, like multiple personalities, only all are characters created by her, and thus they don't know who she is, because, well, they barely know who they are. ... Read More Ethanial
I can't say I dig Lynch's work. It's one thing to base movies on atmosphere and visuals ahead of plot, but when you spend the length of a movie thinking "What the f***?" it ruins the whole experience. I wish I could get paid that much money to make a movie that noone understands... ... Read More chilipenguin
official website message boards. There are some very smart people on there with some very intriguing ideas. Oh, and Damon's full of crap. ... Read More curtbainer
I've thought long and hard about the themes behind this film, since seeing it last saturday and i have to say i am in some ways inclined to agree with Damon Wise, but i also think it has a autobiographical theme to it. About the process Lynch goes through in making his films. This is not an easy theroy to explain but basically Lynch becomes so embroiled in his material as he writes it that fiction and reality merge and he becomes the characters in his films, like Damon explains above about Nikki... Read More truthisoutthere
L: teamchico
Trying to decipher the film is totally pointless...shouldn't it be all about our personal experience of the film? Just leave it alone!
sp;
So why does David Lynch say it makes perfect sense? Three words: Unified Field Theory. ... Read More Gator
Trying to decipher the film is totally pointless...shouldn't it be all about our personal experience of the film? Just leave it alone! ... Read More teamchico
This is an extremely pointless and banal interpretation of a wonderful work of art. Lynch's films aren't puzzles and shouldn't be treated as such. ... Read More konatus
i wonder how many people are gonna read this before they watch the film and then act like they figured it completely out from their first screening. i just have to say that the score for this was amazing. ... Read More doomforlife
well i think that is a good start for the overall basis of the film. but i dont think it comes close to explaining various bits within the film. why is her 'audience' a load of prostitues, who is the woman who wants to stab her, who is the man she talks to upstairs from the night club, why if 'her work is done' does she then disapear if really that implies she does not even exist. personally i prefer to go along the lines of susan being an alter ego to the polish actress. but what ever you want ... Read More mr_pringel
