The Grandmother

No matter how cynical you make think this film is, it is very realistic in what our world looks like as children. Dysfunctional families are all around us and we experience neglect very often. A child's point of view of course, is always exaggerated. I can relate to some of what is shown in "The Grandmother." Throughout my childhood my grandmother was the only person i could turn to. My parents talk, and their life during my childhood was very blurred to me. And the horrifying things that happen are more horrifying than they really are as a child. Lynch may have imaged this film out of nowhere, but it still speaks. The use of sound, and animation is powerfully effective. This is a must for Lynch fans!

This is a very odd, and rather disturbing short. If you're not into Lynch then give it a wide birth, even if you are, then approach with caution. The story concerns itself with an unhappy boy who grows a grandmother. Well, that's all I could work out anyway. The rest of the film is filled with bed wetting, barking parents, and bizarre animations. Everything is in disturbingly garish colours (generally deep blue), and there isn't a single line of dialogue. See this if you're a die-hard Lynch fan or if you're a budding experimental film maker. If, however, you found Eraserhead too weird then steer well clear.

One of the most disturbing things i've ever seen. The actors in this film, David Lynch's third film technically, but his first narrative film, were never in any other movies - one of them, Father, died a few years ago - it is as if they exist only in the frightening nightmare world of this boy's life, which consists of two dog-like parents who only bark at him with unintelligible sounds, and beat him and rub his face in the urine when he wets the bed, like a puppy. The subject of the film (and if i don't tell you this, it'll make so little sense to you, because its never properly explained in the film) is the boy has no love from his parents, and no grandmother to give him respite from them and comfort him, so he grows one in the attic.

It is a horrifying, brilliant film, which creates an imaginative world very successfully - albeit one you desparately want to escape from as soon as possible, but it does this well at least.

The Lynchian oeuvre is almost fully formed here, right from the start. Little dialogue, atmospheric soundtrack of constant sound effects which you find in Eraserhead, Elephant Man, Lost Highway and Mulholland Dr; impressionistic approach to performance and makeup/costume and sets; the quality of estrangement in the direction, and most importantly there is the union of terrible, twisted darkness and optimistic naivety (developed to the full in Blue Velvet and Mulholland Dr).

For Lynch fans, this is a thing to see. Unlike Six Men Getting Sick or The Amputee, this is not just an experiment or an early film of a Director that ruins your impression of them, it stands on its own, irrespective of Lynch's subsequent work (though it also sets the tone for his subsequent narrative work) as a great surrealist/impressionist narrative short.

This film is a lesson. A lesson on how you can, with minor means,

create a work which explores all ways of cinematography. And this

without any dialogue. In my idea films are not there to tell a story

(they can be used as such tough) and this movie goes straight

back to the time where films were shown at carnivals and gave you

a glimpse of new worlds to be explored. Don't worry too much about the (lack of) narritive story. Just sit back

and enjoy the huge amount of emotions that will come to you.

Fear, hatred, love and desire for a better world.

Sick, disturbing and surreal short from David Lynch. A man and a woman get married and have a son who they don't really want. The child grows up being horribly abused by his parents. Then, in a dark sinister room, he plants a seed who sprouts into a grandmother. She, in a way, shows him the affection his parents never gave him. There's more but I won't spoil it.

The film mixes live actors with animation seamlessly. It has sound but no dialogue--the actors just make sounds somewhat like human speech. It's in washed-out color which certainly fits the subject matter. Also you see Lynch using odd noises on the soundtrack which he perfected years later with "Eraserhead". I'm giving this film a 10 but it is VERY disturbing. It's definitely not for everybody. The abuse scenes are horrible to watch and the nonstop morbidness did start to wear on me, but I couldn't stop watching. It all leads to a very sad ending. Sick, troubling and (at times) horrifying movie but just incredible. A 10 but only for those who can stand extreme subject matter.