Italiano
Lynch/Oz by Alexandre O. Philippe , distributed by Wanted Cinema, will be released in Italian cinemas from 8th to 10th May 2023. The film was presented in the programme of the 17th Rome Film Fest.
LYNCH/OZ
Director
Alexandre O. Philippe
Nation
USA
Year
2022
Duration
109′
Cast
Karyn Kusama
John Waters
David Lowery
Rodney Ascher
Amy Nicholson
Justin Benson
The themes, images, and cultural impact of Victor Fleming’s film The Wizard of Oz continue to haunt the art and filmography of filmmaker David Lynch. From his first short film, The Alphabet, to his latest TV series, Twin Peaks: The Return, the connection has given rise to one of the most fascinating riddles in film history: is Lynch trapped in the land of Oz? Can his films shed fresh light on the film classic, and can Oz tell us something new about Lynch’s oeuvre?
COMMENTARY
After his acclaimed essay films The People vs. George Lucas and 78/52 (on the shower scene in Psycho), Alexandre O. Philippe probes the ties between Victor Fleming’s The Wizard of Oz (1943) and David Lynch’s disturbing, fairy-tale universe. The influence of Oz emerges not just in the obvious places (Wild at Heart, Twin Peaks: The Return), but also in films with a subtler yet at times deeper link, from The Elephant Man and Mulholland Drive to Lost Highway. Our guides to the six sections of Philippe’s film include John Waters, Rodney Ascher (director of Room 237), Karyn Kusama (Jennifer’s Body, Destroyer), and David Lowery (Disney’s upcoming Peter Pan & Wendy). In this journey into the American imagination and its recurring dreams and fears, Philippe was allowed to draw more freely on Lynch’s films than ever before, making for some revealing comparisons.
ALEXANDRE O. PHILIPPE
Born in Geneva, Alexandre O. Philippe is a director who specializes in documentaries that analyzes film genres, cult movies, and the films and poetics of master filmmakers: The People vs. George Lucas; Doc of the Dead, on the zombie genre; 78/52, on Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho, and the famous shower scene in particular; Memory: The Origins of Alien, on Ridley Scott’s classic; Leap of Faith: William Friedkin on The Exorcist; The Taking, on the role of Monument Valley in western films.
DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT
The Wizard of Oz is America’s foundational and most beloved fairytale. Victor Fleming’s 1939 Hollywood adaptation has embedded itself in the American psyche. And there’s little doubt that the most enigmatic of contemporary American auteur filmmakers, David Lynch, keeps tapping into themes, images, motifs, and ideas stemming from that land somewhere over the rainbow. If Lynch keeps consciously and subconsciously returning to that well, tapping into his surrealist visual language and leitmotifs may be our key to cracking the code of that fairytale’s hold on the American psyche, and the resonance and significance of a classic that has much to say about America’s dreams, aspirations, and fears.
