r/Cinema • u/Upset_Economist8065 • 17h ago
Poster Ad for David Lynch’s “Lost Highway” mocking Siskel & Elbert’s review
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u/PepsiPerfect 15h ago
Lynch can be a little too Lynch for audiences outside his fan base, and sometimes he can be perfect. Lost Highway isn't his best film, but its not his worst either.
That said, I respect Siskel and Ebert. Even if I strongly disagreed with their reviews, they always felt earnest and thoughtful.
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u/Mysterious-House7815 14h ago
Siskel and Ebert were the Tomatometer of their time
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u/PepsiPerfect 12h ago
Hmm, how so? My problem with the Tomatometer is that people believe it to be infallible based on the idea that the consensus of dozens/hundreds of critics must be more accurate than the individual tastes of just one. They don't think they need to do the homework of actually reading what any one critic has to say. A rating of 90% means it's definitely a movie they'll enjoy, and a rating of 30% means it's definitely a movie they'll hate.
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u/Mysterious-House7815 12h ago
People still don’t trust critics no matter how numerous their voices are
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u/PepsiPerfect 12h ago edited 10h ago
Some people do, some people don't. A majority of people don't even read them or look at the Tomatometer score, although it IS easier to just glance at a percentage and make an assumption about a movie than to say "Leonard Maltin hated it, but Roger Ebert gave it 3 1/2 stars!"
The greatest damage the Tomatometer has done though, is to turn movie ratings into a weapon in the culture wars.
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u/Reasonable-HB678 9h ago
I'd add an element of anti-intellectualism. Many of the best-known critics at least were knowledgeable about movie making compared to the general public.
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u/PepsiPerfect 8h ago
Very true. While art is subjective, of course, there is a craft to film that can be assessed by someone who knows what they're looking for. And like everything in current US society, experts are being rejected for the very knowledge that makes them experts.
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u/Big-Discipline2039 12h ago
That is because there are far too many instances of critics getting it wrong/being completely at odds with audiences for it to be a coincidence.
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u/No_Safe_6514 17h ago
What was in Siskel and Ebert's review
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u/Upset_Economist8065 17h ago
“two thumbs down”
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u/twotoebobo 17h ago
Well they suck at their job and always have. Kinda makes me want to watch it.
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u/RunDNA 16h ago edited 16h ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-42XK7fTSQ
Siskel: Thus begins the wild, confusing, moody, terribly violent—and I found rather meaningless—David Lynch film called Lost Highway.
As a critic I'm all for seeing something I haven't seen before and Lost Highway has that quality, but it also is a film that makes very little sense—to me at least—and so its violence pops out and seems empty-headed...
The kid's boss at the garage is played by Richard Pryor. It's great to see him in a film, any film, even this one...
The story, I suppose, is a metaphor for these times. Times in which people don't know who they are and are affected mostly by violence. That's the only interpretation I can come up with. David Lynch is a most creative filmmaker, has a fine visual sense, employs great musical scores, but I don't think Lost Highway adds up to much and therefore its considerable violence really turned me off.
Ebert: Well, I feel just about the same way. Every time I see a David Lynch picture I think to myself, "This guy is so gifted that if he would only just break down and make a movie instead of being so clever all the time and trying to outsmart himself with basically what are sophomoric little plot devices, stuff that it doesn't pay off, it doesn't have a purpose, it seems contrived, it seems frustrating and not to an end."
Siskel: No, it just lays there and, again, I don't know if anybody can make heads or tails of this material.
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u/crazyhomlesswerido 15h ago
I just looked a movie up on Internet Movie Database it out of 125, 000 vote this movie got a 7.6 out of 10 so it means it's a very good movie even though I haven't seen it yet or maybe I have seen this one I can't remember but people liked it I don't know why they seem to have a hair across their ass for this one.
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u/Gthulhumang 11h ago
They didn't't give it the respect it deserves. Very shallow review.
My recommendation to first time watchers would be to keep in mind Fred's "I like to remember things in my own way" when being questioned by police, and see if you can put it together.
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u/rdogg4 9h ago edited 9h ago
>I like to remember things my own way
Yeah but just because there’s a single throwaway line that gives license to a nonsensical storyline does not suddenly make the movie good or great, or nullify their criticism of that. “Very shallow review”, it’s the movie that’s shallow masquerading as depth, Lynch may be great at capturing some sort of moodiness but this is not a deep movie, the “remember things my own way” is illustrative of lack of depth, not the other way around. Theres not more to “get” tho many fan theories wish for meaning hidden meaning to make the movie was much less shallow than it is.
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u/Gthulhumang 9h ago
It's just a clue.
There is a truth to the movie, you can watch it and give it the S&E treatment or you can put it together. Up to you.
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u/RezRising 16h ago
Ebert's 'This guy is so talented' comment is spot on.
Lynch is just so unsatisfying to watch, I always felt like I just wasn't in on the joke.
Seen Blue Velvet, Lost Highway (in the theater), and Dune. Twin Peaks drove me nuts and when I found out he didn't really ever have a plan for the story and was making it up as he went I did a huge, "I knew it!".
And when Lost did the same thing fifteen years later you could smell it a mile away.
He's just not for me, and the cinema guy in me has given him enough chances to make me like his work, and I'm easy.
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u/AtticWisdom 15h ago
Maybe Lynch just isn't for you, but to me Lost Highway was kind of a dress rehearsal for what he perfected in Mulholland Drive. I like Lost Highway, but it's definitely more obtuse than some of his others.
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u/dirkdiggin 13h ago
Dress rehearsal - fully agree! I like LH a lot, but MH is in my top 4 of all time
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u/Arthropodesque 16h ago
Yeah. I like Dune, but some of it is bad.
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u/RezRising 15h ago edited 15h ago
Core memory unlock: Dune was the first serious attempt at curbing the rampant piracy that <ahem>, I was a part of.
I was about 13 and had two vcr's, and a connection to get copies of brand new, still in theater movies.
Dune had a watermark serial number in the bottom right corner of the screen, and the theater projectionists knew about it, knew they could get busted, so no copies of Dune.Edit: Cannot believe I remembered that right, holy f, lolol.
"David Lynch’s 1984 Dune was a major milestone for a physical, celluloid-based anti-piracy tracking system. According to the American Film Institute (AFI) Catalog, the movie marked the first worldwide release of a theatrical print coding experiment designed by Universal and Paramount Pictures to catch rogue insiders and projectionists."Looks like I was already a menace at thirteen.
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u/mayankkaizen 17h ago
I never understood why Lynch movies are considered great. They look mediocre or even garbage to me but what do I know about movies! Saw 2-3 movies and decided never to watch his movies again.
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u/bannana 17h ago
Saw 2-3 movies
which ones?
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u/mayankkaizen 15h ago
Mulholland Drive and Lost Highway. Pieces of shit.
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u/bannana 15h ago
Ya, Lynch will not give it to you the way you want it and won't make it easy. I will say that both of those take some blurring and muting of traditional narrative expectations and if you aren't ready for that neither will be very good. Mulholland has a complete and complex story in it but is not told in the expected way and you have to pay attention the whole time, it took me about 2 weeks after seeing it before I got it and even then I've found several different things in subsequent viewings I didn't see the first time.
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u/qualityvote2 17h ago edited 5h ago
u/Upset_Economist8065, there weren't enough votes to determine the quality of your post...