David Lynch is All Growed Up

(:)(:)(:)(:) Four Snouts Up for The Straight Story directed by David Lynch.

We've happily entered that unfortunate phase of American life where every sector of the family has its own Netflix queue.

The movies Bill picks are uniformly excellent, one 4 snouter after another. The kids are watching every Free Willy movie in succession, ending with The War Room (that was a bad Bill Clinton joke, in case you missed it).

Bill sticks to his films. The kids stick to theirs. But I brouse. I watch everyone's films. And when I need a break from the whales and the 4 starsers, I watch one of the 2 or 3 snouters that I've put in my own queue-- I'm afraid Bridget Jones Diary: beyond reason provides a representative example.

Tonight, Bill pitched his feature presentation simply but clearly to me, "do you want to watch a David Lynch film about a man who rides across the country on a lawn mower?"

Who could say no to that invitation? I hopped up next to him on the John Deere and we headed off.

If you're like me, when you think David Lynch you think dwarves, you think Laura Dern hotter than wet asphalt, you think Dennis Hopper in a clown suit and most of all you think rape, with scissors or without--your choice--but you don't think sweet old man on a rider mower spreading wisdom and hope across the middle west.*

But that's what this film is. It is just a sweet sweet film, not sticky sweet, not saccharin (and I've got quite the taste for fake sugar, my friend), but profoundly and deeply sweet. From the bottom of your soul, end of your life, no regrets, sweet.

Based on a true story with lovely lovely performances by Richard Farnsworth and Sissy Spacek. Rated G.

*One scene does contain a nod to the old Lynch where a woman becomes hysterical from killing her 12th deer on the same stretch of highway in as many days. "I've tried everything. I even play Public Enemy full blast! Where do they come from?!!"