i was able to make sense of it.
could you? i am curious, did the girl with the cheeks represent anything or was she just a figment of his imagination? I have my own ideas, and they change everytime I see the movie. It also depends on my 'state of mind'.. (look at my avatar). To answer your questions---
i am curious, did the girl with the cheeks represent anything or was she just a figment of his imagination?
There is a strong theme of deformity in the movie. All the characters are messed up physically in one way or another. Except for the girl across the hall, since she was his idealized vision of beauty. The lady in the radiator was pretty, but her cheeks messed up her face.
when he started pulling mutant sperms out of his wife, was that a dream? did it indicate his fear of having more children?
If you mean the scene where he reaches under the covers and starts throwing the sperm against the wall, I think it's represents his fear of having more children, and his disgust at what he has already created.
when the girl with the cheeks started stepping on his mutant nerd sperms, was she trying to extinguish his fear of having more children?
I think the fact that she was stepping on the eggs and sperm while singing " in heaven, everything is fine" implies that when the chance of reproduction is destroyed, it's heavenly.
do you think lynch might be implying that the polution from industrial waste could be affecting our fertility?
No. I think he just used that backdrop to make the situation Henry is in seem more desperate. There's literally no one normal to turn to. He is totally isolated. I just pulled tubes at my friend's house while watching. Was there a point? I thought it was just more Avant Gard film? There's a part 2? *runs to video store*
But seriously:
It's David's "Philadelphia Story". More so, it's an organic (yet mechanical) hybrid of the torturous experience of living in both a disgusting, hyper-industrialized city and moreover the fear of fatherhood.
It's also, arguably, the most "cinematic" film I've ever seen (re: sound design, visuals, art direction).
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Answers:
"i am curious, did the girl with the cheeks represent anything or was she just a figment of his imagination?"
The Lady in the Radiator. I want to say something before I answer these questions: distinguishment of dream/reality in a film like 'Eraserhead' is rather pointless because of how the narrative is constructed. Since 'Eraserhead' is so definitively personal (re: spiritual) to Lynch, we must account for the fact that many of what transpires are projections of his (the main character's) fears about his environment and situations. The "white noise" that endures the entire feature references just how "trapped" and "inescapable" the city or world really is.
Thus, the film works rather intuitively, in the same ways that we're constantly being breached subconscious and conscious anxieties that are heightened by things that are both related (what we're focusing on) and not related (what we've tuned out).
The Lady in the Radiator is essentially a projection of escapism for the protagonist. Her line, "In Heaven Everything is Fine" can be taken rather literally, in fact. Or also, she can be seen as a representation as "sanctity" and "purity". Nevertheless, tarnished (physically and ideologically) by the world.
"when he started pulling mutant sperms out of his wife, was that a dream? did it indicate his fear of having more children"
I think your latter interpretation is most correct. It's been a while since I've seen the film, so I really need to revisit this scene because I can't recall picture it that well.
"do you think lynch might be implying that the pollution from industrial waste could be affecting our fertility"
I think that's a bit too literal, since Lynch's motifs are hardly that euphemistic. Of course, you're right in the sense that the baby is just a fluctuating account of the disgusting, inescapable torment of Henry's environment; everything is projected to and back to each other in this film. |
