Inland Empire (2006) - Dern stands out in Lynch's nightmarish art film epic

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+ Best Art Film of the Year + Best Character Study of the Year + Best Comeback Actress of the Year: Laura Dern

The brights lights of Los Angeles are glamorous on top, - but below lies terrifying darkness. - So this powerful poster for David Lynch's Inland Empire seems to infer

Hollywood star Nikki Grace wins a lead in a new movie, which, however, turns out to actually be a remake of an old, cursed film, which was never completed in the past.

Inland Empire is written and directed as the 10th feature from Montanan master filmmaker David Lynch (The Straight Story (1999)). It may well be Lynch's last major theatrical work, if we choose not to count Twin Peaks: The Missing Pieces (2014), which is made up of deleted scenes from Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992).
Laura Dern (F Is for Family (2015-17)) gives a lead performance which deserves praise; fearless and deeply disquieting, it leads us on the epic excursion into a reality that in both fascinating and deeply disturbing ways crackles down for our protagonist. We sense that we are moving in clearly defined story universes in Inland Empire, which are merely presented mystically and in inexplicable ways to us. In this way the film is never pretentious nonsense, (although Lynch novices may think so and are therefore adviced against beginning their journey into the man's body of work with this particular film.)
SPOILER A very specific criticism: There is a scene in Inland Empire of Dern relating stuff to a man with glasses, which is simply too long.
If this turns out to be the last real movie in Lynch's oeuvre, it somehow seems fitting, since Inland Empire must be the most radical, strange and unsettling film of his since his debut, Eraserhead (1977). Both are fiercely original and rare works that require a lot from their audiences and deserve several revisits. Inland Empire is truly an art film, which at times resembles a performance or an exhibited art piece; it has unforgettably unpleasant scenes and an eccentric and original ugly video aesthetic.

Related posts:

David Lynch: Top 10: Best Hollywood-set movies

2006 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]

2006 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]

2006 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]

Blue Velvet (1986) or, The Strange World 

Dune (1984) - Lynch heads to space, with an (unsurprisingly) strange result

Top 10: The best biopic movies reviewed by Film Excess to date

The Elephant Man (1980) - Lynch's deeply moving second feature

Eraserhead (1977) - Lynch's extraordinary, unconquerably strange and surreal debut

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: Unknown
Box office: 4 mil. $
= Uncertain
[Inland Empire premiered 6 September (Venice Film Festival, Italy) and runs 180 minutes. Lynch co-financed the film himself, (he has only revealed that it had a budget of under 100 mil. $), and shot it over a 3-year period in California, including Los Angeles, and in Poland, - without a script. The actors were given pages of freshly written dialog on the day of shooting them and never knew exactly what Inland Empire was about. It was shot with a Sony digital camcorder by Lynch himself, - the first time he has worked in digital video instead of film. He also edited it himself and stayed involved in its distribution. It opened #52 to a 27k $ first weekend in North America in 2 theaters, where it peaked #44 and in 15 cinemas (different weeks) and grossed 861k $. The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were France with 609k $ and the UK with 542k $. It was likely made for somewhere between 1-5 mil. $, but that span is too great to establish whether it was a theatrical hit or flop. Lynch campaigned for Dern to be nominated for the Best Actress Oscar without luck. The film did win an award in Venice. Lynch has stated on the occasion of his Twin Peaks revival season (2017) that he had made his last feature. In between the two major projects, he has made at least 26 short films. Dern returned in Year of the Dog (2007). Inland Empire is fresh at 73 % with a 7.2/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Inland Empire?

Iron Man 2 (2010) - Favreau and Theroux's boisterous, entertaining sequel

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1 Film Excess nomination:

Best Sound (lost to Insidious) 

+ Best Superhero Movie of the Year

The very professionally crafted poster for Jon Favreau's Iron Man 2

Iron Man is under pressure: The Iron Man suit makes him sick, the US military wants his technology and a bitter Russian by the name of Vanko is joining forces with his competitor Justin Hammer to eradicate him...

Unlike many other critics, I feel that the second chapter in the Iron Man trilogy is a vast improvement over the first film. It contains the rather bizarre parring of Robert Downey Jr. (The Shaggy Dog (2006)) and Mickey Rourke (Point Blank (1998)). - Few if any would have believed 15 years ago that these two troublemakers would be heading a major superhero movie, commanding the world box office in 2010.
Rourke plays the villainous Whiplash, who comprises the film's excellent heel duo together with Sam Rockwell (Moon (2009)). Everything sparkles here; the dialog is smart and snappy, and although Stark's narcissism gets the best of him in the second half of the film, he gets much better counter-balance in this sequel than in the first film; from smolderingly sexy Scarlett Johansson (The Jungle Book (2016)), pal Don Cheadle (Hotel Rwanda (2004)) and Garry Shandling (Trust the Man (2005)), who is very funny as a senator that tries to oppose Tony Stark aka. Iron Man.
None of the action is revolutionary, but it's done with a sense of joy. This is a tall tale of Hollywood nonsense, glittering and ridiculous, but enjoyable nonetheless because it is well-made and thoroughly dedicated in all of its well-sounding formula affection.
Iron Man 2 is solid good fun throughout. It is written by Justin Theroux (Rock of Ages (2012)) and directed by Jon Favreau (Elf (2003)), who left the director's chair on the franchise after doing these two first films.

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Jon Favreau: The Jungle Book (2016) - Favreau's great, widest appealing movie to date
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess 

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 200 mil. $
Box office: 623.9 mil. $
= Box office success
[Iron Man 2 premiered April 26 (El Capitan Theatre, Hollywood) and runs 125 minutes. One of the things that raises the film is that it replaced Terrence Howard with Don Cheadle, a decision that didn't go over silently, understandably. Filming lasted 71 days from April - July 2009 in Monaco, California and England. The film opened #1 to a 128.1 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it stayed atop for one more week before getting the boot from Shrek Forever After and grossed 312.4 mil. $ (50.1 % of the total gross). It had the highest-grossing opening weekend in North America of 2010, where it was also the third highest-grossing film of the year after Toy Story 3 and Alice in Wonderland. Internationally, it was the 7th highest grossing film of the year. Its 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 30.4 mil. $ (4.9 %) and South Korea with 27 mil. $ (4.3 %). The film was Oscar-nominated for Best Effects, losing to Inception. Iron Man 2 is certified fresh at 72 % with a 6.5 critical average.]

What do you think of Iron Man 2?