Movies - Lost Highway

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	Movies - Lost Highway

Lost Highway is a 1997 film directed by David Lynch. It is a crime film, arguably an example of contemporary film noir, but with surreal imagery and themes. Lynch co-wrote the screenplay with Barry Gifford; the soundtrack is by Angelo Badalamenti. Perhaps dealing with the fallibility of human memory, the film is, to many people, a confusing but unforgettable experience.

Structure

The filmmakers have compared the structure of the film to a Möbius strip. A little more helpful is David Lynch's comment in the screenplay that the story is about a murderer with multiple personalities, told from the different points of view of these personalities.

Responses

Famously, the film received "two thumbs down" from Siskel and Ebert - though Lynch used this to his advantage by claiming it was "two good reasons to go and see Lost Highway".

Comparisons

Lynch's creativity in Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, and Mulholland Drive have a common ground, one of characters struggling to make sense of the dark and gloomy crime-ridden worlds they find themselves in. His directorial freedom has increased over the years, commensurate with the success he has realized in his projects, allowing him to take ever greater chances in throwing together desperate characters in shady scenarios, and then seeing what happens to them when the carpet gets yanked from under them. Lost Highway and Mulholland Drive seem to have a particular connection, since both movies feature a character fantacizing or perhaps living double lives.

Principal cast

Bill Pullman
as Fred Madison
Patricia Arquette
as Renee Madison/Alice Wakefield
Robert Blake
as Mystery Man ("I'm there right now")
Robert Loggia
as Dick Laurent/Mr Eddy
Balthazar Getty
as Pete Dayton
Marilyn Manson as Porno star #1
Jeordie White aka Twiggy Ramirez as Porno star #2
Giovanni Ribisi
as Steve 'V' Vincencio
Henry Rollins
as Guard Henry
Richard Pryor
as Arnie
Gary Busey
as William Dayton

Soundtrack

The soundtrack features a number of contributions from Angelo Badalamenti, a consistent Lynch collaborator, as well as Barry Adamson, and Trent Reznor. Also appearing are tracks from David Bowie, Nine Inch Nails, The Smashing Pumpkins, Lou Reed, Marilyn Manson, and Rammstein.

Some tracks were recorded at a sound studio in Prague.

Screenplay

Lost Highway has been published as a screenplay by David Lynch and Barry Gifford by Faber & Faber (ISBN 0571191509). The book also includes a 15 page interview of Lynch by Chris Rodley.

Opera

Lost Highway was adapted as an opera by Austrian composer Olga Neuwirth. The opera was premiered in Graz in 2003. It will have its American premiere at the Miller Theater in New York City in February, 2007.

Other uses

Lost Highway is the title of a 2003 BBC documentary series in 4 episodes on the history of country music, perhaps titled after the Hank Williams song of the same name.

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