The MacGuffin

Another Top 5 segment from The MacGuffin. This time Allen and Brandi share their top 5 directorial debuts.

This segment is also available on Stitcher, iTunes and YouTube. The audio version can be downloaded directly from here. After you’ve watched the video please vote in our poll and share which one you think is the best.

Spencer and Greg discuss Aaron Eckhart in advance of The Rum Diary, think about horror films that influenced them growing up and give DVD picks of the week.

A few weeks ago here on the MacGuffin, Michael wrote an unfavorable review of David Lynch’s 1976 feature debut, Eraserhead. Summing up his feelings of the film, Michael wrote: “In conclusion, all I can say is that I would not suggest this movie. At all. … It looks as if I may be mostly alone in this deliberation though.”

While I am aware that Eraserhead is now generally considered by film buffs to be a classic of a certain genre, and an impressive debut film from a uniquely talented director, it is not a film I have read critical pieces about. I am not looking to represent the majority dissenting opinion that Michael alludes to in his review; I’m not entirely sure such a majority exists. What I want to do is simply explain why, for me, Eraserhead is absolutely worth your time.

Eraserhead is the first feature length film from writer/director David Lynch, who has brought us Blue Velvet and Mulholland Dr. While I have heard great things about both of those films and Mr. Lynch in general, this was the first of his movies that I took the time to watch. If I only had one word to describe this movie, it would be bizarre. One type of movie that I am always a huge fan of is bizarre, but this film took it way over the edge. It took the weirdness so far that it distracted from the plot which there was not much of anyway. David Lynch has gone on record as saying that no one has ever gotten the true meaning of the film and that he likes it that way.