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Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me - Blu-ray Review

5 beersBecause everyone has a secret.

The stand-up bass; the muted trumpet; and those ominous chords.  It’s all about the cool jazz of composer Angelo Badalamenti, folks.  But the close-up on the static-filled television suggests that, this time out, Twin Peaks – after ending its two-year run on ABC with an audience-angering cliffhanger – is going to break free from what once held it back. 

And Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me does exactly that.

It was the big screen and, even though the quality of the second season had dipped (it bounced back nicely, mind you), expectations were huge so why not open with a blank slate; a close-up of static.  Clear the slate and the mind.  It’s an intentional announcement that things are going to be different this time. 

No, there will be no long discussions on clarifying the end of season two’s cliffhanger.  You will see familiar faces and hear familiar sounds – starting with Laura Palmer’s infamous scream and Federal Bureau of Investigation Regional Bureau Chief Gordon Cole (David Lynch) – but you should not expect more of the same.  That’s the beginning of Fire Walk Me and, for fans of the television show; the impact of what they were about to see would not fully resonate until several years later.

It was received as a stuffy-headed disaster and not as the EXCELLENT film that it truly is.  Full of humor and mystery, all of that went unnoticed when it premiered.  The audiences at Cannes are reported to have mercilessly booed it.  Quentin Tarantino famously scorned the movie, suggesting that Lynch, a director he used to worship, had travelled so far up his own ass that he’d not watch anything Lynch had to say afterwards.

Here’s the thing about this movie, Fire Walk With Me was never about concluding the story Twin Peaks.  It was a prequel whose purpose was to open the mystery of the Blue Rose and, more specifically, detail the last seven days of Laura Palmer’s life.  And it deals with incest, rape, and murder.  Little wonder then that the film did so poorly.  People don’t often rush out and buy tickets for a movie about incest.

Fire Walk With Me was a true departure from what fans thought they would be experiencing.  Upon its closing moments, as an angel hovers over Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) no one knew what to make of writer/director David Lynch’s movie.  We have the benefit of now experiencing Twin Peaks: The Return; we know of the film’s significance and, yes, it truly is a masterpiece. 

Starting with the mysterious murder of a teenage prostitute named Teresa Banks (Pamela Gidley) and the search for her ring, the movie begins in the sleepy town of Deer Meadow, Washington.  Agent Chester Desmond (Chris Issak) and Agent Sam Stanley (Keifer Sutherland) are assigned the case and, after meeting Cole and a woman named Lil wearing a tailored red dress with a red wig and a blue rose pinned to it, begin their investigation into her death.  We are already on edge as the movie begins its balancing act and comedy and murder.  And Desmond will have to butt heads with the local police department in order to get to the bottom of the mystery.

And we haven’t even entered into the fictional town of Twin Peaks yet.  Just know that the first 45-minutes of this movie is of most importance to the far-reaching mythology of the (ongoing?) series.

Co-starring Moira Kelly, David Bowie, Harry Dean Stanton, Ray Wise, Kyle MacLachlan, Mädchen Amick, Dana Ashbrook, Grace Zabriskie, and Frank Silva as Bob, Fire Walk With Me amps up the sex and violence and sends us whirlwind of sound and vision as we get our first glimpse of what the future of the Twin Peaks series would be like, by diving into its immediate past.

Fire Walk With Me is now available on blu-ray from Criterion.  It is an important release that should not be ignored by fans of Twin Peaks, especially with the Twin Peaks: The Return scheduled for release on blu-ray in December.  Gobble, gobble, gobble.

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Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me - Blu-ray Review

MPAA Rating: R for strong violence, sex, and drug content, and for language.
Runtime:
135 mins
Director
: David Lynch
Writer:
David Lynch, Robert Engels
Cast:
Sheryl Lee, Ray Wise, Mädchen Amick
Genre
: Drama | Mystery
Tagline:
These are the last seven days of Laura Palmer.
Memorable Movie Quote: "Well damn, Cooper, that really narrows it down. You're talking about half the high school girls in America!"
Theatrical Distributor:
New Line Cinema
Official Site:
Release Date:
August 28, 1992
DVD/Blu-ray Release Date:
October 17, 2017
Synopsis: A young FBI agent disappears while investigating a murder miles from Twin Peaks that may be related to the future murder of Laura Palmer; the last week of the life of Laura Palmer is chronicled.

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[tab title="Blu-ray Review"]

Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me - Blu-ray Review

Blu-ray

Blu-ray Details:

Home Video Distributor: Criterion
Available on Blu-ray
- October 17, 2017
Screen Formats: 1.85:1
Subtitles
: English SDH
Audio:
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 (48kHz, 24-bit); English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0
Discs: Blu-ray Disc; - single disc set
Region Encoding: Locked to Region A

Restored 4K digital transfer, with 7.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray, both supervised by director David Lynch, Criterion’s handling of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me is quite excellent.  Visually, the movie itself has never looked better than here in its remastered 1080p/AVC-encoded video presentation. The colors are more vibrant and details are sharper than ever before.  Sound is very important to Lynch and the 7.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray, supervised by Lynch is quite intense.  Also included is the alternate original 2.0 surround soundtrack, presented in DTS-HD Master Audio on the Blu-ray.

Supplements:

Commentary:

  • None

Special Features:

Fans who have yet to fork over the money for The Entire Mystery will be happy to discover that Criterion also gives them The Missing Pieces.  This is the movie-length of deleted scenes that was compiled featuring all of our favorite folks.  We get 90-minutes of deleted and alternate takes from the film, all assembled by Lynch himself.  We also get a new interview with Lee, from 2017, and 2014’s reunion with Lee, Wise, and Zabriskie.  We also get a NEW interview with Badalamenti who talks at length about the creation of the movie’s important themes.  We also get an excerpt of an interview with Lynch from Lynch on Lynch, a 1997 book edited by filmmaker and writer Chris Rodley

  • The Missing Pieces
  • Interview with Sheryl Lee, Ray Wise, and Grace Zabriskie

  • Interview with Sheryl Lee

  • Interview with composer Angelo Badalamenti

  • Trailers

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[tab title="Art"]Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me - Blu-ray Review

 

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