Eraserhead

I just rewatched Eraserhead. Had only watched it back in my teen years and didn't remember much.

It might be a bit of a naive interpretation, but I see it as a first person perspective into a classic descent to insanity.

This guy had a miserable life in an awful environment and it went downwill with his girlfriend pregnancy. We're watching the subconscious interpretation of those events in the first person and the eventual complete breakdown of Henry's mind.

Lynch has always been a master at representing the subconscious, fears, dreams and nightmares. The scene when the couple is lying on the bed with the baby crying and the wind storming outside. The oppressive nature of the dark makes me think of being sick and unable to sleep in a winter night. That horrible feeling that the night will never end. How tf is he able to evoke those dark things from the depths of my brain, I will never understand.

And the humour is so dark. The girl pulling the suitcase from under the bed. The baby laughing at him. The dancing girl stepping on the fetuses. The mad father asking "Well Henry, what do you know?". Something is happening here but you don't know what it is, do you Mr Jones?

It's one hell of a film that I doubt I'll ever watch again.