Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me

David Lynch was always an outlier in the Hollywood industrial system, but with Twin Peaks he tapped into something very deep in the American imagination, and it was an alternate world to which he returned several times. Yet this prequel to the hit TV series is the opposite of a cash-in. Indeed it’s no exaggeration to say that Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me is the most bizarre, shocking, intense and heartrending American movie of the past three decades. Received with boos at its Cannes Film Festival premiere in 1992, this prequel to the hit TV series has recently been seen for what it is: David Lynch in his element, a visionary work of cinematic surrealism featuring a fearless and unforgettable performance from Sheryl Lee as the doomed Laura Palmer.

Cryptic and elusive, the film follows her through the last week of her life and teasing out the enigmas that surround her murder. Homecoming queen by day and drug-addicted thrill seeker by night, Laura leads a double life that pulls her deeper and deeper into horror as she pieces together the identity of the assailant who has been terrorizing her for years. Nightmarish in its vision of an innocent torn apart by unfathomable forces, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me is nevertheless one of Lynch’s most humane films, aching with compassion for its tortured heroine—a character as enthralling in life as she was in death.

David Lynch’s masterpiece.

Calum Marsh, Village Voice