Table of Contents

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Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
lntroduction
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THE FIRST DIVE
SUFFOCATING RUBBER CLOWN SUIT
STARTING OUT
THE ART LIFE
A GARDEN AT NIGHT
CURTAINS UP
CINEMA
INTERPRETATION
THE CIRCLE
IDEAS
DESIRE
CONSCIOUSNESS
TRANSLATING THE IDEA
LOS ANGELES
ERASERHEAD
THE PACE OF LIFE
YOGIS
BOBCS BIG BOY
THE ANGRIEST DOG IN THE WORLD
MUSIC
INTUITION
THE UNIFIED FIELD
THE FOURTH STATE
GETTING THERE
MODERN SCIENCE AND ANCIENT SCIENCE
ANYWHERE, ANYTIME
IDENTITY
FINAL CUT
THERAPY
DREAMS
ANGELO BADALAMENTI
SOUND
CASTING
REHEARSAL
FEAR
ALL TOGETHER NOW
TWIN PEAKS
THE CONTINUING STORY
THE RED ROOM
ASK THE IDEA
TEST AUDIENCE
GENERALIZATIONS
DARKNESS
SUFFERING
LIGHT OF THE SELF
A TOWER OF GOLD
RELIGION
DRUGS
TURN ON THE LIGHT
INDUSTRIAL SYMPHONY NO. 1
LOST HIGHWAY
RESTRICTIONS
MULHOLLAND DRIVE
THE BOX AND THE KEY
A SENSE OF PLACE
BEAUTY
TEXTURE
WORKING WITH WOOD
HAVING A SETUP
FIRE
LIGHT ON FILM
THE STRAIGHT STORY
HEROES OF FILM
FELLINI
KUBRICK
INLAND EMPIRE
THE NAME
A NEW WAY TO WORK
DIRECTORCS COMMENTARY
THE DEATH OF FILM
DV FOR YOUNG FILMMAKERS
DV OUALITY
FUTURE OF CINEMA
COMMON SENSE
ADVICE
SLEEP
KEEP AT IT
SUCCESS AND FAILURE
GONE FISHING, AGAIN
COMPASSION
CONSCIOUSNESS - BASED EDUCATION
REAL PEACE
IN CLOSING
CODA: TRUE HAPPINESS LIES WITHIN
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5ELECT FlLMOCRAPHY
5OURCE5 OUOTED
A8OUT THE AUTHOR
|EREMY P. TARCHER/PENGUIN
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eISBN : 978-1-101-04330-1
1. Transcendenta Medtaton. 2. Creatve abtyC"Regous aspects.
3. Creaton (Lterary, artstc, etc.). I.Tte.
BF637.T68L
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To His Holiness Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
INTRODUCTION
Ideas are ke fsh.
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If you want to catch tte fsh, you can stay n the shaow water. But f you want to
catch the bg fsh, youCve got to go deeper.
Down deep, the fsh are more powerfu and more pure.TheyCre huge and
abstract. And theyCre very beautfu.
I ook for a certan knd of fsh that s mportant to me, one that can transate to
cnema. But there are a knds of fsh swmmng down there. There are fsh for
busness, fsh for sports.There are fsh for everythng.
Everythng, anythng that s a thng, comes up from the deepest eve. Modern
physcs cas that eve the Unfed Fed. The more your conscousnessC"your
awarenessC"s expanded, the deeper you go toward ths source, and the bgger
the fsh you can catch.
My thrty-three-year practce of the Transcendenta Medtaton program has been
centra to my work n fm and pantng and to a areas of my fe. For me t has
been the way to dve deeper n search of the bg fsh. In ths book, I want to share
some of those experences wth you.
THE FIRST DIVE
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He whose happiness is within, whose contentment is within, whose light is all within, that yogi, being one with
8rahman, attains eternal freedom in divine consciousness.
8HACAVAD-ClTA
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When I frst heard about medtaton, I had zero nterest n t. I wasnCt even
curous. It sounded ke a waste of tme.
What got me nterested, though, was the phrase Cotrue happness es wthn.C!
At frst I thought t sounded knd of mean, because t doesnCt te you where the
CowthnC! s, or how to get there. But st t had a rng of truth. And I began to
thnk that maybe medtaton was a way to go wthn.
I ooked nto medtaton, asked some questons, and started contempatng dfferent
forms. At that moment, my sster caed and sad she had been dong
Transcendenta Medtaton for sx months.There was somethng n her voce. A
change. A quaty of happness. And I thought, ThatCs what l want.
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So n |uy 1973 I went to the TM center n Los Angees and met an nstructor, and I
ked her. She ooked ke Dors Day. And she taught me ths technque. She gave
me a mantra, whch s a sound-vbraton-thought. You donCt medtate on the
meanng of t, but tCs a very specfc sound-vbraton-thought.
She took me nto a tte room to have my frst medtaton. I sat down, cosed my
eyes, started ths mantra, and t was as f I were n an eevator and the cabe had
been cut. Boom! I fe nto bssC"pure bss. And I was |ust in there. Then the
teacher sad, CoItCs tme to come out; tCs been twenty mnutes.C And I !
sad,CoITCS ALREADY BEEN TWENTY MINUTES?!C And she sad, CoShhhh! !
C because other peope were medtatng. It seemed so famar, but aso so new !
and powerfu. After that, I sad the word CounqueC shoud ! be reserved for ths
experence.
It takes you to an ocean of pure conscousness, pure knowngness. But tCs
famar; tCs you. And rght away a sense of happness emergesC"not a
goofba happness, but a thck beauty.
I have never mssed a medtaton n thrty-three years. I medtate once n the
mornng and agan n the afternoon, for about twenty mnutes each tme.Then I go
about the busness of my day. And I fnd that the |oy of dong ncreases. Intuton
ncreases. The peasure of fe grows. And negatvty recedes.
SUFFOCATING RUBBER CLOWN SUIT
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lt would be easier to roll up the entire sky into a small cloth than it would be to obtain true happiness without
knowing the 5elf.

UPANl5HAD5
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When I started medtatng, I was fed wth anxetes and fears. I fet a sense of
depresson and anger.
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I often took out ths anger on my frst wfe. After I had been medtatng for about
two weeks, she came to me and sad, CoWhatCs gong on?C I was quet for a !
moment. But fnay I sad, CoWhat do you mean?C And she sad, CoThs !
anger, where dd t go?C And I hadnCt even reazed that t had fted. !
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I ca that depresson and anger the Suffocatng Rubber Cown Sut of Negatvty.
ItCs suffocating, and that rubber stinks. But once you start medtatng and
dvng wthn, the cown sut starts to dssove. You fnay reaze how putrd was the
stnk when t starts to go.Then, when t dssoves, you have freedom.
Anger and depresson and sorrow are beautfu thngs n a story, but theyCre ke
poson to the fmmaker or artst. TheyCre ke a vse grp on creatvty. If
youCre n that grp, you can hardy get out of bed, much ess experence the fow
of creatvty and deas. You must have carty to create. You have to be abe to
catch deas.
STARTING OUT
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I started out |ust as a reguar person, growng up n the Northwest. My father was a
research scentst for the Department of Agrcuture, studyng trees. So I was n the
woods a ot. And the woods for a chd are magca. I ved n what peope ca sma
towns. My word was what woud be consdered about a cty bock, maybe two
bocks. Everythng occurred n that space. A the dreamng, a my frends exsted n
that sma word. But to me t seemed so huge and magca. There was penty of
tme avaabe to dream and be wth frends.
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I ked to pant and I ked to draw. And I often thought, wrongy, that when you got
to be an adut, you stopped pantng and drawng and dd somethng more serous.
In the nnth grade, my famy moved to Aexandra,Vrgna. On the front awn of my
grfrendCs house one nght, I met a guy named Toby Keeer. As we were takng,
he sad hs father was a panter. I thought maybe he mght have been a house
panter, but further takng got me around to the fact that he was a fne artst.
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Ths conversaton changed my fe. I had been somewhat nterested n scence, but I
suddeny knew that I wanted to be a panter. And I wanted to ve the art fe.
THE ART LIFE
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In hgh schoo, I read Robert HenrCs book The Art 5pirit, whch prompted the
dea of the art fe. For me, vng the art fe meant a dedcaton to pantngC"a
compete dedcaton to t, makng everythng ese secondary.
That, I thought, s the ony way youCre gong to get n deep and dscover thngs.
So anythng that dstracts from that path of dscovery s not part of the art fe, n
that way of thnkng. Reay, the art fe means a freedom. And t seems, I thnk, a
har sefsh. But t doesnCt have to be sefsh; t |ust means that you need tme.
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Bushne Keeer, the father of my frend Toby, aways had ths expresson: CoIf you
want to get one hour of good pantng n, you have to have four hours of
unnterrupted tme.C!
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And thatCs bascay true. You donCt |ust start pantng. You have to st for a
whe and get some knd of menta dea n order to go and make the rght moves.
And you need a whoe bunch of materas at the ready. For exampe, you need to
bud framework stretchers for the canvas. It can take a ong tme |ust to prepare
somethng to pant on. And then you go to work. The dea |ust needs to be enough
to get you started, because, for me, whatever foows s a process of acton and
reacton. ItCs aways a process of budng and then destroyng. And then, out of
ths destructon, dscoverng a thng and budng on t. Nature pays a huge part n
t. Puttng dffcut materas togetherC"ke bakng somethng n sunght, or usng
one matera that fghts another materaC"causes ts own organc reacton.Then
tCs a matter of sttng back and studyng t and studyng t and studyng t; and
suddeny, you fnd youCre eapng up out of your char and gong n and dong
the next thng.ThatCs acton and reacton.
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But f you know that youCve got to be somewhere n haf an hour, thereCs no
way you can acheve that. So the art fe means a freedom to have tme for the
good thngs to happen.ThereCs not aways a ot of tme for other thngs.
A GARDEN AT NIGHT
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So I was a panter. I panted and I went to art schoo. I had no nterest n fm. I
woud go to a fm sometmes, but I reay |ust wanted to pant.
One day I was sttng n a bg studo room at the Pennsyvana Academy of the Fne
Arts.The room was dvded nto tte cubces. I was n my cubce; t was about three
oCcock n the afternoon. And I had a pantng gong, whch was of a garden at
nght. It had a ot of back, wth green pants emergng out of the darkness. A of a
sudden, these pants started to move, and I heard a wnd. I wasnCt takng drugs!
I thought, Oh, how fantastic this is| And I began to wonder f fm coud be a way to
make pantngs move.
At the end of each year, there was an expermenta pantng and scupture contest.
The year before, I had but somethng for the contest, and ths tme I thought:
lCm going to do a moving painting. I but a scuptured screenC"sx feet by eght
feetC"and pro|ected a pretty crudey anmated stop-moton fm on t. It was caed
5ix Men Cetting 5ick. I thought that was gong to be the extent of my fm career,
because ths thng actuay cost a fortune to makeC"two hundred doars. l simply
canCt afford to go down this road, I thought. But an oder student saw the pro|ect
and commssoned me to bud one for hs home. And that was what started the ba
rong. After that, I |ust kept gettng green ghts.Then tte by tteC"or rather eap
by eapC"I fe n ove wth ths medum.
CURTAINS UP
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lnow that all of Nature is but a magic theater, that the great Mother is the master magician, and that this whole
world is peopled by her many parts.
UPANl5HAD5
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ItCs so magcaC"I donCt know whyC"to go nto a theater and have the
ghts go down. ItCs very quet, and then the curtans start to open. Maybe
theyCre red. And you go nto a word.
ItCs beautfu when tCs a shared experence. ItCs st beautfu when
youCre at home and your theater s n front of you, though tCs not qute as
good. ItCs best on a bg screen. ThatCs the way to go nto a word.
ClNEMA
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Cnema s a anguage. It can say thngsC"bg, abstract thngs. And I ove that about
t.
ICm not aways good wth words. Some peope are poets and have a beautfu
way of sayng thngs wth words. But cnema s ts own anguage. And wth t you
can say so many thngs, because youCve got tme and sequences. YouCve
got daogue. YouCve got musc. YouCve got sound effects. You have so many
toos. And so you can express a feeng and a thought that canCt be conveyed
any other way. ItCs a magca medum.
For me, tCs so beautfu to thnk about these pctures and sounds fowng
together n tme and n sequence, makng somethng that can be done ony through
cnema. ItCs not |ust words or muscC"tCs a whoe range of eements
comng together and makng somethng that ddnCt exst before. ItCs teng
stores. ItCs devsng a word, an experence, that peope cannot have uness
they see that fm.
When I catch an dea for a fm, I fa n ove wth the way cnema can express t. I
ke a story that hods abstractons, and thatCs what cnema can do.
INTERPRETATION
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A fm shoud stand on ts own. ItCs absurd f a fmmaker needs to say what a
fm means n words.The word n the fm s a created one, and peope sometmes
ove gong nto that word. For them that word s rea. And f peope fnd out certan
thngs about how somethng was done, or how ths means ths or that means that,
the next tme they see the fm, these thngs enter nto the experence. And then
the fm becomes dfferent. I thnk tCs so precous and mportant to mantan
that word and not say certan thngs that coud break the experence.
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You donCt need anythng outsde of the work.There have been a ot of great
books wrtten, and the authors are ong snce dead, and you canCt dg them up.
But youCve got that book, and a book can make you dream and make you thnk
about thngs.
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Peope sometmes say they have troube understandng a fm, but I thnk they
understand much more than they reaze. Because weCre a bessed wth
ntutonC"we reay have the gft of ntutng thngs.
Someone mght say, I donCt understand musc; but most peope experence
musc emotonay and woud agree that musc s an abstracton. You donCt need
to put musc nto words rght awayC"you |ust sten.
Cnema s a ot ke musc. It can be very abstract, but peope have a yearnng to
make nteectua sense of t, to put t rght nto words. And when they canCt do
that, t fees frustratng. But they can come up wth an expanaton from wthn, f
they |ust aow t. If they started takng to ther frends, soon they woud see
thngsC"what somethng s and what somethng snCt. And they mght agree
wth ther frends or argue wth ther frendsC"but how coud they agree or argue f
they donCt aready know? The nterestng thng s, they reay do know more
than they thnk. And by vocng what they know, t becomes cearer. And when they
see somethng, they coud try to carfy that a tte more and, agan, go back and
forth wth a frend. And they woud come to some concuson. And that woud be
vad.
THE CIRCLE
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I ke the sayng: CoThe word s as you are.C And I thnk fms are as you !
are.ThatCs why, athough the frames of a fm are aways the sameC"the same
number, n the same sequence, wth the same soundsC"every screenng s
dfferent. The dfference s sometmes subte but tCs there. It depends on the
audence.There s a crce that goes from the audence to the fm and back. Each
person s ookng and thnkng and feeng and comng up wth hs or her own sense
of thngs. And tCs probaby dfferent from what I fe n ove wth.
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So you donCt know how tCs gong to ht peope. But f you thought about how
tCs gong to ht peope, or f tCs gong to hurt someone, or f tCs gong to
do ths or do that, then you woud have to stop makng fms. You |ust do these
thngs that you fa n ove wth, and you never know whatCs gong to happen.
IDEAS
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An dea s a thought. ItCs a thought that hods more than you thnk t does when
you receve t. But n that frst moment there s a spark. In a comc strp, f someone
gets an dea, a ghtbub goes on. It happens n an nstant, |ust as n fe.
It woud be great f the entre fm came a at once. But t comes, for me, n
fragments. That frst fragment s ke the Rosetta Stone. ItCs the pece of the
puzze that ndcates the rest. ItCs a hopefu puzze pece.
In 8lue Velvet, t was red ps, green awns, and the songC"Bobby VntonCs
verson of CoBue Vevet.C The next thng was an ear yng n a fed. And that !
was t.
You fa n ove wth the frst dea, that tte tny pece. And once youCve got t,
the rest w come n tme.
DESIRE
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Desre for an dea s ke bat.When youCre fshng, you have to have patence.
You bat your hook, and then you wat.The desre s the bat that pus those fsh
nC"those deas.
The beautfu thng s that when you catch one fsh that you ove, even f tCs a
tte fshC"a fragment of an deaC"that fsh w draw n other fsh, and theyC
hook onto t.Then youCre on your way. Soon there are more and more and more
fragments, and the whoe thng emerges. But t starts wth desre.
CONSCIOUSNESS
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Through meditation one realizes the unbounded.
That which is unbounded is happy.
There is no happiness in the small.

UPANl5HAD5
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Ltte fsh swm on the surface, but the bg ones swm down beow. If you can
expand the contaner youCre fshng nC"your conscousnessC"you can catch
bgger fsh.
HereCs how t works: Insde every human beng s an ocean of pure, vbrant
conscousness. When you CotranscendC n Transcendenta Medtaton, you dve !
down nto that ocean of pure conscousness. You spash nto t. And tCs bss.
You can vbrate wth ths bss. Experencng pure conscousness envens t,
expands t. It starts to unfod and grow.
If you have a gof-ba-szed conscousness, when you read a book, youC have a
gof-ba-szed understandng; when you ook out a wndow, a gof-ba-szed
awareness; when you wake up n the mornng, a gof-ba-szed wakefuness; and as
you go about your day, a gof-ba-szed nner happness.
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But f you can expand that conscousness, make t grow, then when you read that
book, youC have more understandng; when you ook out, more awareness;
when you wake up, more wakefuness; and as you go about your day, more nner
happness.
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You can catch deas at a deeper eve. And creatvty reay fows. It makes fe more
ke a fantastc game.
TRANSLATING THE IDEA
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To me, every fm, every pro|ect, s an experment. How do you transate ths dea?
How do you transate t so that t goes from an dea to a fm or to a char?
YouCve got ths dea, and you can see t and hear t and fee t and know t. Now,
etCs say you start cuttng a pece of wood and tCs |ust not exacty rght.That
makes you thnk more, so you can take off from that. YouCre now actng and
reactng. So tCs knd of an experment to get t a to fee correct.
When you medtate, that fow ncreases. Acton and reacton go faster. YouC get
an dea here, then youC go there, and then there. ItCs ke an
mprovsatona dance. YouC |ust be zppng aong; youC be bangng on a
eght cynders.
And tCs not a pretend thng; tCs not a fee-good program, where they te
you,CoStop and sme the roses, and your fe w get better.C It com ! es from
wthn. It has to start from deep wthn, and grow and grow and grow.Then thngs
reay change.
So transcend, experence the SefC"pure conscousnessC"and watch what
happens.
LOS ANGELES
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I came to Los Angees from Phadepha, where I had ved for fve years, attendng
art schoo. Phadepha s known as the Cty of Brothery Love, but when I was there,
t was a hehoe.There wasnCt a ot of ove n that cty.
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I arrved n L.A. at nght, so t wasnCt unt the next mornng, when I stepped out
of a sma apartment on San Vcente Bouevard, that I saw ths ght. And t thred
my sou. I fee ucky to ve wth that ght.
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I ove Los Angees. I know a ot of peope go there and they see |ust a huge spraw
of sameness. But when youCre there for a whe, you reaze that each secton
has ts own mood. The goden age of cnema s st ave there, n the sme of
|asmne at nght and the beautfu weather. And the ght s nsprng and energzng.
Even wth smog, thereCs somethng about that ght thatCs not harsh, but
brght and smooth. It fs me wth the feeng that a possbtes are avaabe. I
donCt know why. ItCs dfferent from the ght n other paces. The ght n
Phadepha, even n the summer, s not neary as brght. It was the ght that
brought everybody to L.A. to make fms n the eary days. ItCs st a beautfu
pace.
ERASERHEAD
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Eraserhead s my most sprtua move. No one understands when I say that, but t
s.
Eraserhead was growng n a certan way, and I ddnCt know what t meant. I was
ookng for a key to unock what these sequences were sayng. Of course, I
understood some of t; but I ddnCt know the thng that |ust pued t a together.
And t was a strugge. So I got out my Bbe and I started readng. And one day, I
read a sentence. And I cosed the Bbe, because that was t; that was t. And then I
saw the thng as a whoe. And t fufed ths vson for me, 100 percent.
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I donCt thnk IC ever say what that sentence was.
THE PACE OF LIFE
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Ffty years ago, peope were sayng,CoEverythngCs speedng up.C Twenty !
years ago, they were st sayng,CoEverythngCs speedng up.C It aways !
seems that way. And t seems even more so now. ItCs crazy. When you watch a
ot of TV and read a ot of magaznes, t can seem ke the whoe word s passng
you by.
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When I was makng Eraserhead, whch took fve years to compete, I thought I was
dead. I thought the word woud be so dfferent before t was over. I tod mysef,
Here l am, locked in this thing. l canCt finish it.The world is leaving me behind. I
had stopped stenng to musc, and I never watched TV anyway. I ddnCt want to
hear stores about what was gong on, because hearng these thngs fet ke dyng.
At one tme, I actuay thought of budng a sma fgure of the character Henry,
maybe eght nches ta, and constructng a sma set out of cardboard, and |ust
stop-motonng hm through and fnshng t. That was the ony way I coud fgure
dong t, because I ddnCt have any money.
Then, one nght, my younger brother and my father sat me down n a knd of dark
vng room. My brother s very responsbe, as s my father.They had a tte chat
wth me. It amost broke my heart, because they sad I shoud get a |ob and forget
Eraserhead. I had a tte gr, and I shoud be responsbe and get a |ob.
A
We, I dd get a |ob: I devered the Wall 5treet journal, and I made ffty doars a
week. I woud save up enough to shoot a scene and I eventuay fnshed the whoe
thng. And I started medtatng. |ack Nance, the actor who payed Henry, wated
three years for me, hodng ths thought of Henry, keepng t ave.ThereCs a
scene n whch |ackCs character s on one sde of a door, and t wasnCt unt a
year and a haf ater that we fmed hm comng through the other sde of the door. I
wondered, how coud ths happen? How coud t hang together for so ong? But |ack
wated and hed the character.
ThereCs an expresson: CoKeep your eye on the doughnut, not on the hoe.C!
If you keep your eye on the doughnut and do your work, thatCs a you can
contro. You canCt contro any of whatCs out there, outsde yoursef. But you
can get nsde and do the best you can do.
The word isnCt gong to pass you by. ThereCs no guarantee that medtaton
or deverng the Wall 5treet journal s gong to make you a success. But wth focus
and wth medtatonC"athough the events of your outer fe may stay the
sameC"the way you go through those events changes and gets so much better.
YOGIS
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When I frst saw pctures n books of yogs sttng cross-egged n the woods n the
forests of Inda, somethng woud make me ook twce. ICd notce ther faces. And
t wasnCt the face of a man wastng tme. It was the face of a man hodng
somethng that I not ony wanted, but I ddnCt know about. I was drawn to
t.There was such a presence of power and dgntyC"and an absence of fear. Many
of ther countenances hed payfuness or ove, or power and strength.
That made me thnk that enghtenment must be somethng rea, even though I
ddnCt know what t was. I fgured the ony way to try for t was to start dvng
wthn and see what unfoded. Because I knew that wasnCt gong to happen wth
fe on the surface n L.A.
BOBCS BIG BOY
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I used to go to BobCs Bg Boy restaurant |ust about every day from the md-
seventes unt the eary eghtes. ICd have a mk shake and st and thnk.
ThereCs a safety n thnkng n a dner. You can have your coffee or your mk
shake, and you can go off nto strange dark areas, and aways come back to the
safety of the dner.
THE ANGRIEST DOG IN THE WORLD
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The Angriest Dog in the World strp came about when I was workng on Eraserhead.
I drew a tte dog. And t ooked angry. And I started ookng at t and thnkng about
t, and I wondered why t was angry.
And then I dd a four-bock strp wth the dog never movngC"three panes were set
n the day and one was at nght. So thereCs a passage of tme, but the dog never
moves. And t struck me that tCs the envronment thatCs causng ths
angerC"tCs whatCs gong on n the envronment. He hears thngs comng
from the house. Or somethng happens on the other sde of the fence, or some knd
of weather condton.
It fnay boed down more to what he hears from nsde the house. And that
seemed ke an nterestng concept. That t woud |ust be baoons of daogue from
wthn the house wth the dog outsde. And what was sad n the baoons mght
con|ure a augh.
The L.A. Weekly wanted to pubsh t. So they pubshed t for nne years. After a
coupe of years, t was n the 8altimore 5un as we. Every Monday I had to come up
wth what to say. Then I woud phone t n. I woudnCt aways do the etterng and
sometmes I ddnCt ke the way the etterng ooked, so toward the end I dd
some of the etterng agan.
The edtor who had taken on the cartoon went off to another paper partway through
the run, and I had dfferent edtors.Toward the end of the nne years, the same
edtor who had taken t on came back to that paper. And he asked me not to do t
anymore. It had run ts course.
MUSIC
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I was stenng to the rado one day when I was workng on The Elephant Man, and I
heard Samue BarberCs Adago for Strngs. I fe n ove wth ths pece for the ast
scene of the fm. I asked |onathan Sanger, the producer, to get t. And he came
back wth nne dfferent records. I stened to them, and I sad,CoNo, thatCs not
what I heard at a.C A nne were competey wrong. So he went out and bought !
more. Fnay I heard Andr PrevnCs verson, and I sad,CoThatCs t.C It !
was composed of the same notes as the others, of course, but t was the way he
dd t.
A
The musc has to marry wth the pcture and enhance t. You canCt |ust ob
somethng n and thnk tCs gong to work, even f tCs one of your a-tme
favorte songs. That pece of musc may have nothng to do wth the scene.When t
marres, you can feel t. The thng |umps; a Cowhoe s greater than the sum of
the partsC knd of thng can happen. !
INTUITION
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lnow That by knowing which everything is known.
UPANl5HAD5
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Lfe s fed wth abstractons, and the ony way we make heads or tas of t s
through ntuton. Intuton s seeng the soutonC"seeng t, knowng t. ItCs
emoton and nteect gong together.ThatCs essenta for the fmmaker.
A
How do you get somethng to fee rght? EverybodyCs got the same toos: the
camera and the tapes and the word and actors. But n puttng those parts together,
there are dfferences.ThatCs where ntuton enters.
A
Personay, I thnk ntuton can be sharpened and expanded through medtaton,
dvng nto the Sef. ThereCs an ocean of conscousness nsde each of us, and
tCs an ocean of soutons.When you dve nto that ocean, that conscousness,
you enven t.
You donCt dve for specfc soutons; you dve to enven that ocean of
conscousness. Then your ntuton grows and you have a way of sovng those
probemsC"knowng when tCs not qute rght and knowng a way to make t fee
correct for you. That capacty grows and thngs go much more smoothy.
THE UNIFIED FIELD
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One unbounded ocean of consciousness became light, water, and matter. And the three became many. ln this way
the whole universe was created as an unbounded ocean of consciousness ever unfolding within itself.

UPANl5HAD5
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The ocean of pure conscousness that Maharsh Mahesh Yog taks about s aso
known by modern scence as the Unfed Fed.
When Maharsh frst arrved n the Unted States n 1959, the Unfed Fed from
quantum physcs hadnCt yet been dscovered. So peope woud say, CoOh,
thatCs baoneyC"theyCre ookng for some fed at the base of everythng,
but t doesnCt reay exst; no one knows f tCs true.C But then, about thrty !
years ago, quantum physcs dscovered ths fed.They dscovered t by gong nto
matter, deeper and deeper and deeper, and one day, there t was: the Unfed Fed.
And then scentsts ke Dr. |ohn Hagen sad that tCs true: Every snge thng
that s a thng emerges from ths fed.
So modern scence and ancent scence are comng together.
Vedc scenceC"the scence of conscousnessC"studes the aws of nature, the
consttuton of the unverse, and how t a unfods. In Vedc scence, ths ocean of
pure conscousness s caed Atma, the Sef. CoKnow thy Sef.C We, how? You !
donCt know yoursef by ookng n the mrror. You donCt know yoursef by
sttng down and havng a tak wth yoursef. But tCs there, wthn, wthn, wthn.
Transcendenta Medtaton s a smpe, easy, effortess technque that aows any
human beng to dve wthn, to experence subter eves of mnd and nteect, and
to enter ths ocean of pure conscousness, the Unfed FedC"the 5elf.
ItCs not the nteectua understandng of the fed but the experencng of t that
does everythng. You dve wthn, and by experencng ths fed of pure
conscousness, you enven t; you unfod t; t grows. And the fna outcome of ths
growth of conscousness s caed enghtenment, whch s the fu potenta for us
a.
THE FOURTH STATE
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Many peope have aready experenced transcendng, but they may not reaze t.
ItCs an experence that you can have |ust before you go to seep. YouCre
awake, but you experence a sort of fa, and you maybe see some whte ght and
get a tte |ot of bss. And you say, CoHoy |umpng George!C When you go !
from one state of conscousness to anotherC"for nstance, from wakng to
seepngC"you pass through a gap. And n that gap, you can transcend.
A
I pcture t ke a round whte room that has yeow, red, and bue curtans coverng
the whte wa. The curtans are three states of conscousness: wakng, seepng,
and dreamng. But n the gap between each curtan, you can see the whte of the
AbsouteC"the pure bss conscousness. You can transcend n that tte pece of
whte. Then you come to the next state of conscousness. The whte room reay s
a around you a the tme, even though the curtans cover most of t; so tCs
here, there, and everywhere. And sometmes, wthout knowng t or knowng how,
peope have transcended. Wth Transcendenta Medtaton, from the wakng state of
conscousness you can experence that whte wa anytme when you st and
medtate. ThatCs the beautfu thng about t.
GETTING THERE
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That Atma alone, that state of simplest form of awareness alone, is worthy of seeing, hearing, contemplating, and
realizing.
UPANl5HAD5
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Some forms of medtaton are |ust contempaton or concentraton: theyC keep
you on the surface. You wonCt transcend; you wonCt get that fourth state of
conscousness and you wonCt get that bss. YouC stay on the surface.
Reaxaton technques can take you a tte way n.ThatCs beautfu; tCs ke
havng a massage. But tCs not transcendng.Transcendng s ts own unque
thng.
A
When you dve wthn, the Sef s there and true happness s there.ThereCs a
pure, huge, unbounded ocean of t. ItCs bssC"physca, emotona, menta, and
sprtua happness that starts growng from wthn. And a those thngs that used to
kill you dmnsh. In the fm busness, thereCs so much pressure; thereCs so
much room for anxety and fear. But transcendng makes fe more ke a gameC"a
fantastc game. And creatvty can reay fow. ItCs an ocean of creatvty. ItCs
the same creatvty that creates everythng that s a thng. ItCs us.
A
And why s t so easy? Because tCs the nature of the mnd, because the mnd
wants to go to feds of greater happness. It |ust naturay wants to go. And the
deeper you go, the more there s of that unt you ht 100 percent pure bss.
Transcendenta Medtaton s the vehce that takes you there. But tCs that
experencng of the ocean of pure bss conscousness that does everythng.
MODERN SCIENCE AND ANCIENT SCIENCE
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Scentfcay, more and more s comng out to show that transcendng s rea and ts
benefts are rea. By measurng EEG patterns n bran research, they can prove that
someone s transcendng; they can prove that the person s experencng a fourth
state of conscousness. ICve seen ths n ve demonstratons traveng wth
neuroscentst Dr. Fred Travs.
A
When you work on musc, you use a certan part of your bran. When you tak, you
use another part. When you sng, you use a dfferent part. When you do
mathematcs, you use st another part. But f you want to use your fu bran, you
need to transcend. And then every tme you transcend, you carry a tte bt more of
that transcendenta conscousness as you work on your mathematc probems, as
you sng, or what have you. Your bran s hodng ths coherence no matter what you
do.
ItCs a hostc experence; tCs tota bran functonng. And that ncreasngy
becomes a permanent state the more you experence the Unfed Fed, the more
that conscousness grows. It doesnCt happen overnght, but t happens more and
more each day. Vedc scence has aways sad that ths fed s there and that you
can experence t. And now modern scence, wth each step forward, s affrmng
that.
ANYWHERE, ANYTIME
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You can medtate anywhere. You can medtate n an arport, at work, anywhere you
happen to be.
Usuay, I medtate n the mornng before breakfast, and n the evenng before
dnner. But when ICm shootng, I medtate before I go, and agan at unch. And f
I havenCt medtated ong enough, IC medtate when I fnsh.
ICve been n paces where there are no other medtators around, but tCs very
surprsng: peope knd of ke t. IC ask for a quet room, and they say, CoOh,
yes, yes, IC fnd you a very nce, quet pace, and protect you.C And I go n !
and medtate away.
We waste so much tme on other thngs, anyway. Once you add ths and have a
routne, t fts n very naturay.
IDENTITY
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The thng about medtaton s: You become more and more you.
FINAL CUT
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I ove the French.TheyCre the bggest fm buffs and protectors of cnema n the
word. They reay ook out for the fmmaker and the rghts of the fmmaker, and
they beeve n fna cut. ICve been very ucky that ICve been n wth some
French companes that have backed me.
A
But t wasnCt aways that way. When I made Dune, I ddnCt have fna cut. It
was a huge, huge sadness, because I fet I had sod out, and on top of that, the fm
was a faure at the box offce. If you do what you beeve n and have a faure,
thatCs one thng: you can st ve wth yoursef. But f you donCt, tCs ke
dyng twce. ItCs very, very panfu.
ItCs totay absurd for fmmakers not to be abe to make fms the way they want
to make them. But n ths busness tCs very common.
I came from pantng. And a panter has none of those worres. A panter pants a
pantng. No one comes n and says, CoYouCve got to change that bue.C!
ItCs a |oke to thnk that a fm s gong to mean anythng f somebody ese fddes
wth t. If they gve you the rght to make the fm, they owe you the rght to make t
the way you thnk t shoud be.The fmmaker shoud decde on every snge
eement, every snge word, every snge sound, every snge thng gong down that
hghway through tme. Otherwse, t wonCt hod together. The fm may suck, but
at east you made t suck on your own.
A
So for me, Dune was a huge faure. I knew I was gettng nto troube when I agreed
not to have fna cut. I was hopng t woud work out, but t ddnCt. The end resut
s not what I wanted, and thatCs a sadness.
A
HereCs the thng, though. When you medtate and bss starts comng up nsde,
t s not as panfu. You can rde through thngs ke ths and ve through t. But t
has ked a ot of peope. It has made them not want to make a fm agan.
THERAPY
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I went to a psychatrst once. I was dong somethng that had become a pattern n
my fe, and I thought, Well, l should go talk to a psychiatrist. When I got nto the
room, I asked hm, CoDo you thnk that ths process coud, n any way, damage
my creatvty?C And he sad, CoWe, Davd, I have to be honest: t coud.C ! !
And I shook hs hand and eft.
DREAMS
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I ove dream ogc; I |ust ke the way dreams go. But I have hardy ever gotten deas
from dreams. I get more deas from musc, or from |ust wakng around.
On 8lue Velvet, though, I was reay struggng wth the scrpt. I wrote four dfferent
drafts. And I had some probems wth t near the end. Then one day, I was n an
offce and I was supposed to go n and meet somebody n the next offce. A
secretary was there, and I asked her f I coud have a pece of paper, because I
suddeny remembered that the nght before ICd had ths dream. And there t
was.There were three tte eements that soved those probems.ThatCs the ony
tme thatCs happened.
ANGELO BADALAMENTI
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I met Angeo Badaament on 8lue Velvet and snce then he has composed musc
for a my fms. HeCs ke my brother.
The way we work s: I ke to st next to hm on the pano bench. I tak and Angeo
pays. He pays my words. But sometmes he doesnCt understand my words, so
he pays very bady. Then I say, CoNo, no, no, no, Angeo.C And I change my !
words a tte bt, and he pays dfferenty. And then I say, CoNo, no, no, no,
Angeo,C and I change my words. And somehow through ths process he w catch !
somethng, and IC say, CoThatCs t!C And then he starts gong wth hs !
magc, down that correct path. ItCs so much fun. If Angeo ved next door to me,
ICd ke to do ths every day. But he ves n New |ersey, and I ve n Los Angees.
SOUND
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Sometmes you hear a pece of musc, and t marres to a scene n the scrpt. When
ICm shootng, I w often pay that pece of musc n the headphones whe
stenng to the daogue. Hearng the musc s |ust a verfcaton that thngs are
gong the rght wayC"for nstance, the rght pace or ghtng. ItCs |ust another
too to ensure that youCre foowng that orgna dea and beng true to t. So
tCs a good thng f youCve got some musc up front to pay to see f the scene
works.
Sound s so mportant to the fee of a fm. To get the rght presence for a room, the
rght fee from the outsde, or the rght-soundng daogue s ke payng a musca
nstrument. You have to do a ot of expermentng to get that |ust rght. It usuay
happens after the fm s cut. But ICm aways tryng to gather what I ca
Cofrewood.C So I have pes of thngs I can go to and see f t ! heyC work. You
|ust have to pop one sound n, and you reaze rght away, Oh, that is not working.
CASTING
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It doesnCt matter how wonderfu an actor s; when youCre castng, you have
to pck the person who marres to that part, who can do that part.
I donCt ever gve actors cod readngs. I fee thatCs a torment for them, and I
donCt earn anythng. Pus, then I woud want to start rehearsng wth them. It
woud take a ong, ong tme to do that wth every actor. So I ke to |ust tak wth
them and ook at them whe they tak. I start runnng them through the scrpt n my
head as theyCre takng. Some of them go partway and then stop.Then one of
them w go a the way through, and IC know.
On 8lue Velvet, I worked wth a castng drector, |ohanna Ray. And we had a
brought up Denns Hopper. But everybody sad, CoNo, no; you canCt work wth
Denns. HeCs reay n bad shape, and youC have nothng but troube.C So !
we contnued ookng for peope. But one day, DennsCs agent caed and sad
that Denns was cean and sober and had aready done another pcture, and I coud
tak to that drector to verfy t. Then Denns caed and sad, CoI have to pay
Frank, because I am Frank.C That thred me, and scared ! me.
A
Sometmes, IC have somebody n mnd from the begnnng.ThereCs a
character n Mulholland Drive that worked that way. It was about seven-thrty n the
evenng, and I was dctatng to my assstantC"ths beautfu woman. And I started
takng n a funny way. I started takng ke the cowboy n Mulholland Drive. He |ust
came wakng out. I reazed, after ICd gone on for a whe, that my frend Monty
Montgomery woud be perfect for that. And heCs not even an actor. Though he s
an actor, reay; heCs a very great actor. But he marred to that part.
There are some actors I return toC"Kye MacLachan, for nstance. I ke Kye, and
maybe heCs knd of an ater ego. But the rue of thumb, obvousy, s to get the
rght person for that roe. And thatCs what you go for. So the thng s, even
though Kye s my frend, f heCs not rght for the part, unfortunatey he
doesnCt get that part.
WhatCs aso reay nterestng s that when you work wth somebody, you pck
that person for a partcuar roe. But then, durng unch or somethng, you see
another sde of that person. And you remember that. So f thereCs another roe
that comes up, and somebody says, CoWe, Kye coudnCt do that,C you !
may remember ths sde of hm and say, CoYes, he coud.C!
REHEARSAL
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When you rehearse, t doesnCt matter where you start. You get your actors
together and you |ust pck a scene that defnes the characters n your mnd. You
have the rehearsa, and wherever t s, t s.The thng may be a over the pace.
Then you tak. Often the takng doesnCt appear to make much sense. But t
does to me and to whomever ICm takng wth. You can fee t makng sense. So
the next tme you rehearse, thngs may be a tte coser. And coser st the next
tme.
ThereCs a ot of takng, especay at frst. You can say many thngs, sometmes
strange and stupd words. But you deveop these tte codes wth certan actors or
actresses. For me, for exampe, Comore wndC means Comore mystery.C ! !
ItCs a werd thng. Yet tte by tte, |ust by movng your hand or sayng some
word, a person says, CoAh, ah, okay.C And actors, at a certan pont n eary !
rehearsas, catch on. Then theyCre rong. And a ther taent can go down the
rght track.
The same hods wth everyone you work wth.When peope say Corehearsa,C!
theyCre usuay takng ony about actors. But thereCs a rehearsa that goes
on wth a the peope of the crew, n every department. The dea s to get
everybody to come together and go down the same trackC"the track ndcated by
the deas.
So a prop man, for nstance, may brng a bunch of props, and theyCre totay
wrong, but you say a few thngs, and he says, CoOh, okay,C and h ! e comes
back, and now heCs much coser. And then you say a few more words, and then
he goes back, and now heCs brngng the perfect thngs. ItCs a matter of
takng and acton and reacton.
A
It works the same way wth a departments, because every eement of the fm s
cruca f the whoe s gong to hod together. ItCs aways the same knd of
process. You start rehearsng, and t doesnCt matter how far away thngs are.
|ust start. And you may say,CoOh, my goodnessC"weCre very far away.C!
(You say that nternay, of course!) Then you start takng and rehearsng. And t
begns gettng coser and coser and coser. ItCs an abstract sort of thng, but
everybody s gettng there.The ghtbub goes off at one pont n each person. And
they say,CoI thnk ICve got t.C Then you have another rehearsa. And you !
donCt want to k the thng, so you eave t aone unt you begn shootng.
YouCre aways thnkng of that orgna deaC"the mood, the character. And
through takng, rehearsng, takng, rehearsng, pretty soon t comes. And once
everyone catches that drft, theyCre rong down the ne wth you, and
theyCre fowng wth the thngs that were n the orgna dea.ThatCs how t
works.
FEAR
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I hear stores about drectors who scream at actors, or they trck them somehow to
get a performance. And there are some peope who try to run the whoe busness on
fear. But I thnk ths s such a |okeC"tCs pathetc and stupd at the same tme.
When peope are n fear, they donCt want to go to work. So many peope today
have that feeng.Then the fear starts turnng nto hate, and they begn to hate
gong to work. Then the hate can turn nto anger and peope can become angry at
ther boss and ther work.
A
If I ran my set wth fear, I woud get 1 percent, not 100 percent, of what I get. And
there woud be no fun n gong down the road together. And t should be fun. In
work and n fe, weCre a supposed to get aong. WeCre supposed to have so
much fun, ke puppy dogs wth our tas waggng. ItCs supposed to be great
vng; tCs supposed to be fantastc.
Instead of nstng fear, f a company offered a way for everyone n the busness to
dve wthnC"to start expandng energy and ntegenceC"peope woud work
overtme for free. They woud be far more creatve. And the company woud |ust
eap forward.Ths s the way t can be. ItCs not the way t s, but t coud be that
way so easy.
ALL TOGETHER NOW
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When you work, you want a happy crew gong down the road together. You need
the abty to focus on thngs as a group. You need to concentrate on one thng at a
tme and not have a mon dfferent thngs dstractng you.Ths capacty grows
when peope start medtatng and dvng wthn.
A
ThereCs an expresson: CoWhere the attenton s, that becomes vey.C So !
when you focus on a thng, tCs amost as f you start t movng and vbratng.
You say, CoThs s what weCre gong to do today, ths s where we are, and ths
s what we want to accompsh.C Then the work gets better and the group gets !
happer.
TWIN PEAKS
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Ideas come aong n the strangest way when you |ust pay attenton. And sometmes
thngs happen on the set that make you start dreamng.
When we were shootng the pot for Twin Peaks, we had a set dresser named Frank
Sva. Frank was never destned to be n Twin Peaks, never n a mon years. But
we were shootng n Laura PamerCs home and Frank was movng some furnture
around n her room. I was n the ha, underneath a fan. And a woman sad,
CoFrank, donCt move that dresser n front of the door ke that. DonCt ock
yoursef n the room.C!
A
And ths pcture came to me of Frank n the room. I went runnng n and I asked
Frank, CoAre you an actor?C And he sad, CoWe, yes, I happen to be,C ! !
because everyone n L.A. s an actor. And maybe everyone n the word. So I sad,
CoFrank, youCre gong to be n ths scene.C!
A
We dd a pan shot of the room, twce wthout Frank and then one tme wth Frank
frozen at the base of the bed. But I ddnCt know what t was for or what t meant.
That evenng, we went downstars and we were shootng Laura PamerCs mother
on the couch. She was yng there n sadness and torment. Suddeny she sees
somethng n her mndCs eye and bots uprght, screamng. Sean, the camera
operator, had to turn the whees and foow her face as she boted up. And t ooked
to me ke he dd a perfect |ob. So I sad, CoCutC"perfect, beautfu!C And Sean !
sad, CoNo, no, no. ItCs not.C!
CoWhat s t?C!
CoThere was someone refected n the mrror.C!
A
CoWho was refected n the mrror?C!
CoFrank was refected n the mrror.C!
A
So thngs ke ths happen and make you start dreamng. And one thng eads to
another, and f you et t, a whoe other thng opens up.
THE CONTINUING STORY
A
A
A
I ove gong nto another word, and I ove mysteres. So I donCt reay ke to
know very much ahead of tme. I ke the feeng of dscovery. I thnk thatCs one
of the great thngs about a contnung story: that you can go n, and go deeper and
deeper and deeper. You begn to fee the mystery, and thngs start comng.
A
The popuarty of contnung stores on TV goes n waves. Perodcay, the networks
do these pos. And they come up wth dfferent thngsC"at one tme they had
determned that peope donCt watch every snge week. Peope may watch two
tmes a month and, so the reasonng went, they ose ther way n a contnung story
and drop away from the show. Obvousy, the networks donCt want peope to
drop away, so for a certan perod of tme they soured on a contnung story and
wanted cosed endngs.
A
I donCt know qute how the network decded to et Twin Peaks become a pot.
But |ust because they et somethng become a pot, t doesnCt mean theyCre
gong to make t nto a seres. So t got that far. And even then, they ddnCt
reay know what to do wth t. They send these thngs to a pace; I thnk tCs n
Phadepha. And they have peope watch the shows and grade them. Somehow, t
got a fary good score, but not spectacuar. I donCt know what happened
between that tme and the tme t ared, but t |ust got a huge, huge share that
openng nght. So that was a very ucky thng.
THE RED ROOM
A
A
A
One summer day, I was at a aboratory caed Consodated Fm Industres n Los
Angees.We were edtng the pot for Twin Peaks and had fnshed for the day. It
was around sx-thrty n the evenng and we had gone outsde.There were cars n
the parkng ot. I eaned my hands on the roof of one car, and t was very, very
warmC"not hot, but ncey warm. I was eanng there andC"ssssst|C"the Red
Room appeared. And the backward thng appeared, and then some of the daogue.
A
So I had ths dea, these fragments. And I fe n ove wth them.
ThatCs how t starts.The dea tes you to bud ths Red Room. So you thnk
about t. CoWat a mnute,C you say, Cothe was are red, but theyCre not !
hard was.C Then you thnk some more. CoTheyCre curtans. And theyCre !
not opaque; theyCre transucent.C Then you put these curtans there. CoBut !
the foor . . . t needs somethng.C And you go back to the dea and there was !
somethng on the foorC"t was a there. So you do ths thng on the foor. And you
start to remember the dea more. You try some thngs and you make mstakes, but
you rearrange, add other stuff, and then t fees the way that dea fet.
ASK THE IDEA
A
A
A
The form which embodies that which appeared in consciousnessC"that is to be held within consciousness.
UPANl5HAD5
A
A
A
The dea s the whoe thng. If you stay true to the dea, t tes you everythng you
need to know, reay. You |ust keep workng to make t ook ke that dea ooked,
fee ke t fet, sound ke t sounded, and be the way t was. And tCs werd,
because when you veer off, you sort of know t. You know when youCre dong
somethng that s not correct because t feels ncorrect. It says, CoNo, no; ths
snCt ke the dea sad t was.C And when youCre gettng nto t the correct !
way, t fees correct. ItCs an ntuton: You fee-thnk your way through. You start
one pace, and as you go, t gets more and more fney tuned. But a aong tCs
the dea takng. At some pont, t fees correct to you. And you hope that t fees
somewhat correct to others.
Sometmes, IC go nto a set that was but based on an dea, and for a moment
or so, I thnk I am rght n that dea. ItCs fantastc. But a ot of tmes, you
donCt bud the set; you fnd a ocaton that fees correct, based on that dea.
And the ocaton can be changed n many ways to get coser to the dea.The props
and the ght can be atered. The ght can pay a huge roe n ths. And you |ust
keep workng and workng unt the thng fees correct, based on the dea. If you pay
attenton to a the eements swmmng together, then o and behod, at the very
end, tCs surprsng how cose t a s to that orgna spark.
New deas can come aong durng the process, too. And a fm snCt fnshed unt
tCs fnshed, so youCre aways on guard. Sometmes those happy accdents
occur. They may even be the ast peces of the puzze that aow t a to come
together. And you fee so thankfu: How in the world did this happen?
Durng 8lue Velvet, we were shootng a scene n the apartment of the character
Ben, who s payed by Dean Stockwe. At a certan pont, Dean was gong to sng
CoIn DreamsC by Roy Orbson. He was gong to p-sync to that and sn ! g t to
Denns Hopper. In the scrpt, he was supposed to pck up a sma amp from a tabe
and use t as a mcrophone.
But rght n front of hm on the setC"and Patrca Norrs, the producton desgner,
sad she dd not put t thereC"was ths work amp. It had a ong cord and ts bub
was hdden from the audence, but umnated DeanCs face. And Dean |ust
snatched ths up. He thought t was paced there for hm. ThereCs so many of
these thngs that come aong.
A
Sometmes accdents happen that arenCt happy, but you have to work wth
those as we. You adapt. You throw out ths thng, and throw out that thng, and
throw out another thng. But f you pay attenton to the orgna deaC"stay true to
thatC"tCs surprsng how, at the end, even the thngs that were accdents are
honest.TheyCre true to the dea.
TEST AUDIENCE
A
A
A
Athough you canCt make a fm wth the audence n mnd, at a certan pont,
before tCs fnshed, you need to experence the fm wth a group. Sometmes
you ose your ob|ectvty a tte, and you need to get a fee for whatCs workng
and what snCt. That can be the worst screenngC"very cose to he on earth.
But, agan, the fmCs not fnshed unt tCs fnshed.
A
After you screen t for that group, for the sake of the whoe, certan thngs may have
to be cut down or some thngs may need to be added. TheyCre not exacty
mstakes. Some of the scenes that are removed from a fm are knd of nce scenes
on ther own. But to et the whoe thng work, they have to go. ItCs part of the
processC"t aways happens to some degree.
GENERALIZATIONS
A
A
A
ItCs dangerous, I thnk, to say that a woman n a fm represents a women, or a
man n a fm represents a men. Some crtcs ove generazatons. But tCs that
partcuar character n this partcuar story gong down that partcuar road. Those
specfc thngs make ther own word. And sometmes tCs a word that weCd
ke to go nto and experence.
DARKNESS
A
A
A
Peope have asked me whyC"f medtaton s so great and gves you so much
bssC"are my fms so dark, and thereCs so much voence?
There are many, many dark thngs fowng around n ths word now, and most fms
refect the word n whch we ve.TheyCre stores. Stores are aways gong to
have confct. TheyCre gong to have hghs and ows, and good and bad.
I fa n ove wth certan deas. And I am where I am. Now, f I tod you I was
enghtened, and ths s enghtened fmmakng, that woud be another story. But
ICm |ust a guy from Mssoua, Montana, dong my thng, gong down the road ke
everybody ese.
A
We a refect the word we ve n. Even f you make a perod fm, t w refect your
tmes. You can see the way perod fms dffer, dependng on when they were made.
ItCs a sensbtyC"how they tak, certan themesC"and those thngs change as
the word changes.
And so, even though ICm from Mssoua, Montana, whch s not the surreastc
capta of the word, you coud be anywhere and see a knd of strangeness n how
the word s these days, or have a certan way of ookng at thngs.
SUFFERING
A
A
A
ItCs good for the artst to understand confct and stress.Those thngs can gve
you deas. But I guarantee you, f you have enough stress, you wonCt be abe to
create. And f you have enough confct, t w |ust get n the way of your creatvty.
You can understand confct, but you donCt have to ve n t.
A
In stores, n the words that we can go nto, thereCs sufferng, confuson,
darkness, tenson, and anger. There are murders; thereCs a knds of stuff. But
the fmmaker doesnCt have to be sufferng to show sufferng. You can show t,
show the human condton, show confcts and contrasts, but you donCt have to
go through that yoursef. You are the orchestrator of t, but youCre not n t. Let
your characters do the sufferng.
ItCs common sense: The more the artst s sufferng, the ess creatve he s gong
to be. ItCs ess key that he s gong to en|oy hs work and ess key that he w
be abe to do reay good work.
Rght here peope mght brng up Vncent van Gogh as an exampe of a panter who
dd great work n spte ofC"or because ofC"hs sufferng. I ke to thnk that van
Gogh woud have been even more profc and even greater f he wasnCt so
restrcted by the thngs tormentng hm. I donCt thnk t was pan that made hm
so greatC"I thnk hs pantng brought hm whatever happness he had.
Some artsts beeve that anger, depresson, or these negatve thngs gve them an
edge.They thnk they need to hod on to that anger and fear so they can put t n
ther work. And they donCt ke the dea of gettng happyC"t makes them want
to puke. They thnk t woud make them ose ther edge or ther power.
But you w not ose your edge f you medtate. You w not ose your creatvty. And
you w not ose your power. In fact, the more you medtate and transcend, the
more those thngs w grow, and youC know t. You w gan far more
understandng of a aspects of fe when you dve wthn. In that way, understandng
grows, apprecaton grows, the bgger pcture forms, and the human condton
becomes more and more vsbe.
If youCre an artst, youCve got to know about anger wthout beng restrcted
by t. In order to create, youCve got to have energy; youCve got to have
carty. YouCve got to be abe to catch deas. YouCve got to be strong enough
to fght unbeevabe pressure and stress n ths word. So t |ust makes sense to
nurture the pace where that strength and carty and energy come fromC"to dve
n and enven that. ItCs a strange thng, but tCs true n my experence: Bss
s ke a fak |acket. ItCs a protectng thng. If you have enough bss, tCs
nvncbty. And when those negatve thngs start ftng, you can catch more deas
and see them wth greater understandng. You can get fred up more easy.
YouCve got more energy, more carty. Then you can reay go to work and
transate those deas nto one medum or another.
LIGHT OF THE SELF
A
A
A
He who sees everything as nothing but the 5elf,
and the 5elf in everything he sees,
such a seer withdraws from nothing.
For the enlightened, all that exists is nothing but the 5elf,
so how could any suffering or delusion continue
for those who know this Oneness?
UPANl5HAD5
A
A
A
Negatvty s ke darkness. So what s darkness? You ook at darkness, and you see
that tCs reay nothng: ItCs the absence of somethng. You turn on the ght,
and darkness goes.
But sunght, for nstance, doesnCt get rd of negatvty. It gets rd of darkness,
but not negatvty. So what ght can you turn on that removes negatvty the way
sunght removes darkness? ItCs the ght of pure conscousness, the SefC"the
ght of unty.
DonCt fght the darkness. DonCt even worry about the darkness. Turn on the
ght and the darkness goes.Turn up that ght of pure conscousness: Negatvty
goes.
A
Now you say, CoThat sounds so sweet.C It sounds ! too sweet. But tCs a rea
thng.
A TOWER OF GOLD
A
A
A
just as a mirror shines bright once it has been cleaned of dust,
so those who have seen the 5elf shine in mind and body.
They are always and forever filled with happiness.

UPANl5HAD5
A
A
A
How does medtaton get rd of negatvty?
Pcture t ths way: You are the Empre State Budng. YouCve got hundreds of
rooms. And n those rooms, thereCs a ot of |unk. And you put a that |unk there.
Now you take ths eevator, whch s gong to be the dve wthn. And you go down
beow the budng; you go to the Unfed Fed beneath the budngC"pure
conscousness. And tCs ke eectrc god. You experence that. And that eectrc
god actvates these tte ceanng robots. They start gong, and they start ceanng
the rooms. They put n god where the drt and |unk and garbage were. These
stresses that were n there ke cos of barbed wre can unwnd. They evaporate,
they come out. YouCre ceanng and nfusng smutaneousy. YouCre on the
road to a beautfu state of enghtenment.
RELIGION
A
A
A
I was rased Presbyteran. I respect peope who are regous, and I thnk they fnd
somethng there thatCs beautfu, |ust beautfu. ThereCs truth there. Because
these regons are od, though, and theyCve been fdded wth, possby, I fee
some of the orgna keys from the masters have been ost. But weCre a gong
to the same beautfu goa; thatCs the way I see t.
A regons fow utmatey to the one ocean.Transcendenta Medtaton s a
technque to experence that ocean, and tCs a technque practced by peope
from a regons. Transcendenta Medtaton tsef s not a regonC"tCs not
aganst any regon; tCs not aganst anythng.
DRUGS
A
A
A
We a want expanded conscousness and bss. ItCs a natura, human desre. And
a ot of peope ook for t n drugs. But the probem s that the body, the physoogy,
takes a hard ht on drugs. Drugs n|ure the nervous system, so they |ust make t
harder to get those experences on your own.
A
I have smoked mar|uana, but I no onger do. I went to art schoo n the 1960s, so
you can magne what was gong on. Yet my frends were the ones who sad,
CoNo, no, no, Davd, donCt you take those drugs.C I was pretty ucky. !
A
Besdes, far more profound experences are avaabe naturay.When your
conscousness starts expandng, those experences are there. A those thngs can
be seen. ItCs |ust a matter of expandng that ba of conscousness. And the ba
of conscousness can expand to be nfnte and unbounded. ItCs totaty. You can
have totaty. So a those experences are there for you, wthout the sde effects of
drugs.
TURN ON THE LIGHT
A
A
A
ln the vicinity of YogaC"unityC"hostile tendencies are eliminated.
YOCA 5UTRA5
A
A
A
WeCre ke ghtbubs. If bss starts growng nsde you, tCs ke a ght; t
affects the envronment.
A
If you go nto a room where someoneCs been havng a bg argument, tCs not
so peasant. You can fee t. Even f the argumentCs over, you can fee t. But f
you go nto a room where someone has |ust fnshed medtatng, you can fee that
bss. ItCs very nce to fee that.
A
We a affect our envronments. You en|oy that ght nsde, and f you ramp t up
brghter and brghter, you en|oy more and more of t. And that ght w extend out
farther and farther.
INDUSTRIAL SYMPHONY NO. 1
A
A
A
lndustrial 5ymphony No. J was the frst and ony tme ICve done a stage
producton. It was at the Brookyn Academy of Musc.We had two weeks to set t up,
but ony one day n the actua theater to put t a together and do two
performances.
I was workng on the musc wth Angeo Badaament, and we were attemptng some
abstract musca thngs to te dfferent eements together. I had some peope
budng sets. But from the tme the sets went up, the whoe thng had to be
rehearsed and t n one day.
A
So the day came, and we had the ate mornng and afternoon to rehearse and then
put on two shows. I wanted to start rehearsngC"from the begnnng, to rehearse
a the way through. We started, and about an hour and a haf ater, ICd hardy
even gotten nto the thng, even though t wasnCt very ong. And I reazed that I
was facng a ggantc, defnte dsaster. I thought, lCm never going to make it
unless l get some kind of an idea. And, bngoC"t happened.
Maybe tCs not renventng the wheeC"perhaps tCs |ust common
senseC"but what I dd was, I went one by one. I woud grab ths person and say,
CoDo you see that, over there? When that man there goes there, and then eaves,
then you go there.C And heCd say, CoOkay.C CoAnd when you get there, ! !
you do ths, ths, and ths.C CoOkay.C Then ICd go to the next person, and ! !
ICd say, CoDo you see that man there? When he does ths, ths, and ths, then
tCs your cue to go over here, and you do that, that, and that.C We never had !
a rehearsa, but fortunatey t a worked out.
LOST HIGHWAY
A
A
A
At the tme that Barry Gfford and I were wrtng the scrpt for Lost Highway, I was
sort of obsessed wth the O. |. Smpson tra. Barry and I never taked about t ths
way, but I thnk the fm s somehow reated to that.
What struck me about O. |. Smpson was that he was abe to sme and augh. He
was abe to go gofng ater wth seemngy very few probems about the whoe
thng. I wondered how, f a person dd these deeds, he coud go on vng. And we
found ths great psychoogy termC"Copsychogenc fugueC C"descrbng an !
event where the mnd trcks tsef to escape some horror. So, n a way, Lost
Highway s about that. And aso the fact that nothng can stay hdden forever.
RESTRICTIONS
A
A
A
Sometmes restrctons get the mnd gong. If youCve got tons and tons of
money, you may reax and fgure you can throw money at any probem that comes
aong. You donCt have to thnk so hard. But when you have mtatons,
sometmes you come up wth very creatve, nexpensve deas.
A
My frend Gary DCAmco s a speca effects man. And he oves to bow thngs up.
HeCs the one who bew up the house n Lost Highway. And he ddnCt have
the stuff to do t. I ddnCt even know I was gong to bow up that house.The
producton manager asked, CoAre we gong to tear the house down? Do you want
to save any of the stuff?C And I sad, CoTear t down?C And I started thnkng. ! !
I went to Gary and sad, CoWhat f I wanted to bow up somethng?C Hs face t !
up. And I sad,CoI want to bow up ths house.C!
And he sad, CoOh, I wsh you woud have tod me. I donCt know what ICve
got.C But then he sad, CoYeah, yeahC"we can do t.C And so he went n and ! !
wred up ths thng wth everythng he had. And t was the most beautfu sght. If he
had brought n what he woud have, had he known n advance, t woudnCt have
been as beautfu. It was a soft explosion. It sent the stuff for hundreds of feet. But
softy. And then we shot t backward. So t turned out ncredbe.
MULHOLLAND DRIVE
A
A
A
Mulholland Drive was orgnay gong to be a contnung story on teevson.We shot
t as a pot: open-ended, to make you want to see more and more.
I heard that the man at ABC who was makng the decson whether to accept the
pot or not saw t at sx a.m. He was watchng teevson across the room whe
havng some coffee and makng some phone cas. And he hated what he saw; t
bored hm. So he turned t down.
Then I had the chance, fortunatey, to make t nto a feature. But I ddnCt have
the deas.
A
Now, you donCt use medtaton to catch deas. YouCre expandng the
contaner, and you come out very refreshed, fed wth energy, and rarng to go out
and catch deas afterward.
A
But n ths partcuar case, amost the day I got the go-ahead to turn t nto a
feature, I went nto medtaton, and somewhere about ten mnutes n, ssssst| There
t was. Lke a strng of pears, the deas came. And they affected the mdde, the
begnnng, and the end. I fet very bessed. But thatCs the ony tme tCs
happened durng medtaton.
THE BOX AND THE KEY
A
A
A
I donCt have a cue what those are.
A SENSE OF PLACE
A
A
A
A sense of pace s so crtca n cnema, because you want to go nto another word.
Every story has ts own word, and ts own fee, and ts own mood. So you try to put
together a these thngsC"these tte detasC"to create that sense of pace.
It has a ot to do wth ghtng and sound.The sounds that come nto a room can hep
pant a word there and make t so much fuer.Whe many sets are good enough for
a wde shot, n my mnd, they shoud be good enough for cose scrutny, for the tte
detas to show. You may not ever reay see them a, but youCve got to fee that
theyCre there, somehow, to fee that tCs a rea pace, a rea word.
BEAUTY
A
A
A
When you see an agng budng or a rusted brdge, you are seeng nature and man
workng together. If you pant over a budng, there s no more magc to that
budng. But f t s aowed to age, then man has but t and nature has added nto
tC"tCs so organc.
A
But often peope woudnCt thnk to permt that, except for scenc desgners.
TEXTURE
A
A
A
I donCt necessary ove rottng bodes, but thereCs a texture to a rottng body
that s unbeevabe. Have you ever seen a tte rotted anma? I ove ookng at
those thngs, |ust as much as I ke to ook at a cose-up of some tree bark, or a
sma bug, or a cup of coffee, or a pece of pe. You get n cose and the textures are
wonderfu.
WORKING WITH WOOD
A
A
A
Wood s one of the greatest materas to work wth. There are soft woods and hard
woods, and they a have ther own beauty when you are workng wth them. When I
saw through a pece of freshy cut pne, the sme of t |ust sends me rght to
heaven. The same goes even for pne needes. I used to chew Ponderosa pne ptch,
whch s the sap that oozes out of the tree and dres on the outsde of the bark. If
you can get a fresh pece of ptch, t s ke syrup. It w stck to you and you
wonCt be abe to get t off your hands. But sometmes t hardens ke od honey.
And you can chew ths, and the favor of pne ptch w make you crazy, n a good
way.
Pne, beng a softer wood, s easer to work wth and s ready avaabe. When I was
young, I dd a ot of thngs wth pne. But then, I started fang n ove wth Dougas
fr, vertca-gran Dougas fr. When you varnsh a pece of Dougas fr, t has a depth
of beauty that s |ust phenomena. And then when you put two peces of wood
together, you start reazng there are so many possbtes. And you earn some
trcks aong the way.
And then thereCs GVnter, a German carpenter, who ddnCt use eectrc
toos at a. He woud |ust come up to the house wth a set of hand toos n a
beautfu wooden box wth a hande, whch heCd carry around. And
GVnterC"ICd watch ths manC"dd tte deta work on Dougas fr. He woud
put these two peces of wood together, and then heCd rub hs od, battered
thumbs aganst the seamC"and the seam woud dsappear. It was ke a magc act,
the peces ft so perfecty. GVnter was a rea carpenter.
HAVING A SETUP
A
A
A
Some mornngs, n a perfect word, you mght wake up, have a coffee, fnsh
medtaton, and say,CoOkay, today ICm gong nto the shop to work on a
amp.C Ths dea comes to you, you can see t, but to accompsh t you need what !
I ca a Cosetup.C For exampe, you may need a workng shop or a workng !
pantng studo. You may need a workng musc studo. Or a computer room where
you can wrte somethng. ItCs cruca to have a setup, so that, at any gven
moment, when you get an dea, you have the pace and the toos to make t
happen.
A
If you donCt have a setup, there are many tmes when you get the nspraton,
the dea, but you have no toos, no pace to put t together. And the dea |ust sts
there and festers. Over tme, t w go away. You ddnCt fuf tC"and thatCs
|ust a heartache.
FIRE
A
A
A
Sttng n front of a fre s mesmerzng. ItCs magca. I fee the same way about
eectrcty. And smoke. And fckerng ghts.
LIGHT ON FILM
A
A
A
Often, n a scene, the room and the ght together sgnfy a mood. So even f the
room snCt perfect, you can work wth the ght and get t to fee correct, so that
t has the mood that came wth the orgna dea.
The ght can make a the dfference n a fm, even n a character.
A
I ove seeng peope come out of darkness.
THE STRAIGHT STORY
A
A
A
I ddnCt wrte The 5traight 5tory. It was somethng of a departure for me,
because tCs competey near. But then, I fe n ove wth the emoton of the
scrpt. So you can fa n ove wth somethng that aready exsts, too, and tCs
smar to fang n ove wth an dea. You get that feeng of what t coud be on fm,
and that gudes you.
HEROES OF FILM
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A
A
I am a huge admrer of By Wder. There are two fms of hs that I most ove
because they create such a word of ther own: 5unset 8oulevard and The
Apartment.
And then thereCs Fen, who s a tremendous nspraton. I ke La 5trada and
8C"but reay a of them and, agan, for the word and the characters and the
mood, and for ths eve, whch you canCt put your fnger on, that comes out n
each one.
I ove Htchcock. Rear Window s a fm that makes me crazy, n a good way.
ThereCs such a cozness wth |ames Stewart n one room, and tCs such a coo
room, and the peope who come nto ths roomC"Grace Key, for nstance, and
Thema RtterC"tCs |ust so fantastc that theyCre a n on a mystery
thatCs unfodng out ther wndow. ItCs magca and everybody who sees t
fees that. ItCs so nce to go back and vst that pace.
FELLINI
A
A
A
I was shootng a commerca n Rome, and I was workng wth two peope who had
worked wth Fen. He was n a hospta n northern Itay, but we heard he was
beng moved down to Rome. So I sad, CoDo you thnk tCd be possbe to go
over and say heo to hm?C And they sad, CoYeah, weC try to arrange !
that.C There was an attempt on a Thursday nght that fe th ! rough, but Frday
nght, we went over. It was about sx oCcock n the evenng n summerC"a
beautfu, warm evenng.Two of us went n and were taken nto FenCs
room.There was another man n the room and my frend knew hm, so he went over
and taked to hm. Fen had me st down. He was n a tte wheechar between the
two beds, and he took my hand, and we sat and taked for haf an hour. I donCt
thnk I asked hm much. I |ust stened a ot. He taked about the od daysC"how
thngs were. He tod stores. I reay ked sttng near hm. And then we eft.That was
Frday nght, and Sunday he went nto a coma and never came out.
KUBRICK
A
A
A
Staney Kubrck s one of my a-tme favorte fmmakers, and he dd me a great
honor eary n my career that reay encouraged me. I was workng on The Elephant
Man, and I was at Lee Internatona Studos n Engand, standng n a haway. One of
the producers of The Elephant Man, |onathan Sanger, brought over some guys who
were workng wth George Lucas and sad, CoTheyCve got a story for you.C!
And I sad, CoOkay.C!
They sad, CoYesterday, Davd, we were out at Estree Studos, and we met
Kubrck. And as we were takng to hm, he sad to us, CHow woud you feas ke
to come up to my house tonght and see my favorte fm?C C They !
sad,CoThat woud be fantastc.C They went up, and Staney Kubrck showed !
them Eraserhead. So, rght then, I coud have passed away peacefu and happy.
A
I ke of a KubrckCs fms, but my favorte may be Lolita. I |ust ke the word. I
ke the characters. I ove the performances. |ames Mason s phenomena beyond
the beyond n ths fm.
INLAND EMPIRE
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A
A
We are like the spider.
We weave our life and then move along in it.
We are like the dreamer who dreams and then lives in the dream.
This is true for the entire universe.
UPANl5HAD5
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A
A
When we began, there wasnCt any lNLAND EMPlRE, there wasnCt anythng. I
|ust bumped nto Laura Dern on the street, dscoverng that she was my new
neghbor. I hadnCt seen her for a ong tme, and she sad, CoDavd, weCve
got to do somethng together agan.C And I sad,CoWe sure do. Maybe IC !
wrte somethng for you. And maybe weC do t as an experment for the
Internet.C And she sad, CoFne.C ! !
So I wrote a fourteen-page monoogue, and Laura memorzed a fourteen pages,
and t was about a seventy-mnute take. And she was so phenomena. I coudnCt
reease t on the Internet because t was too good, and t drove me crazy, because
there was somethng about ths that hed a secret for more. And I woud ponder
over ths thng. And somethng more woud emerge. And that woud ead to another
scene. But I woudnCt know what n the word t was, and t ddnCt reay
make much sense. But then, another dea woud come for another scene. And
maybe ths one, the thrd one, was very far removed from the frst two, even though
the second was qute a |ump from the frst.
A
One day we were gettng ready to shoot a scene caed CoThe Ltte House,C!
whch nvoved Laura Dern and my frend Krzysztof Ma|chrzak, an actor from Poand.
Krzysztof arrved n Los Angees fresh from Poand and the CamerImage gang
brought hm over to my house.When he got out of the car, he was wearng these
goofy gasses, and he smed and ponted to the gasses.
A
So I got the dea that he panned to wear these thngs n the scene and I
sad,CoNo, no, no, Krzysztof.C And he sad, CoI need a prop. I need a !
thng.C So I wen ! t nto my offce and I opened up the cupboard and saw a tte
pece of broken te, I saw a rock, and I saw a red ghtbub, but very transparent ke
a Chrstmas ght. I took these thngs out and offered hm a choce. CoTake one of
these, Krzysztof C!C"and he pcked up the bub. I put the other thngs away. I
wasnCt gong to et hm have those anymore. I |ust gave hm the bub. So we
went out to the sma house and Krzysztof came out from behnd a tree wth the red
bub n hs mouth, and thatCs how we shot the scene. So one thng ed to
another.
A
I reay had ths feeng that f thereCs a Unfed Fed, there must be a unty
between a Chrstmas tree bub and ths man from Poand who came n wearng
these strange gasses. ItCs nterestng to see how these unreated thngs ve
together. And t gets your mnd workng. How do these thngs reate when they
seem so far apart? It con|ures up a thrd thng that amost unfes those frst two.
ItCs a strugge to see how ths unty n the mdst of dversty coud go to
work.The ocean s the unty and these thngs foat on t.
And I thought, Well, obviously, thereCs got to be a way that these
relateC"because of this great Unified Field. There coudnCt be a fragment that
doesnCt reate to everythng. ItCs a knd of one thng, I fet. So, I had hgh
hopes that there woud be a unty emergng, that I woud see the way these thngs
a reated, one to another. But t wasnCt unt hafway through that, suddeny, I
saw a knd of form that woud unte the rest, everythng that had come before. And
that was a bg day. That was a good day, because I coud pretty much say that t
woud be a feature fm.
THE NAME
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A
A
One day, st very eary n the process, I was takng to Laura Dern and earned that
her now husband, Ben Harper, s from the Inand Empre n Los Angees. We were
takng aong, and she mentoned that. I donCt know when t popped up, but I
sad, CoThat s the tte of ths fm.C I knew nothng about the fm at the ! tme.
But I wanted to ca t lNLAND EMPlRE.
A
My parents have a og cabn up n Montana. And my brother, ceanng up there one
day, found a scrapbook behnd a dresser. He sent t to me, because t was my tte
scrapbook from when I was fve years od, from when I ved n Spokane,
Washngton. I opened up ths scrapbook, and the frst pcture n t was an aera vew
of Spokane. And underneath t sad, CoInand Empre.C So I fgured I was on the !
rght track.
A NEW WAY TO WORK
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Workng on lNLAND EMPlRE was very dfferent.We shot t entrey n dgta vdeo,
so the eve of fexbty and contro was amazng.
Aso, I ddnCt have a scrpt. I wrote the thng scene by scene, wthout much of a
cue where t woud end. It was a rsk, but I had ths feeng that because a thngs
are unfed, ths dea over here woud somehow reate to that dea over there. And I
was workng wth a very great company, StudoCana n France, who beeved n
meC"enough to et me fnd my way.
DIRECTORCS COMMENTARY
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I donCt do drectorCs commentary tracks on my DVD reeases. I know peope
en|oy extras, but now, wth a the add-ons, the fm |ust seems to have gotten ost.
WeCve got to guard the fm tsef. It shoud stand aone. You work so hard to get
a fm a certan way; t shoudnCt be fdded wth. DrectorCs commentares
|ust open a door to changng peopeCs take on the number one thngC"the fm.
I do beeve n teng stores surroundng a fm, but to comment as tCs rong s
a sacrege.
Instead, I thnk you shoud try to see the whoe fm through, and try to see t n a
quet pace, on as bg a screen as you can wth as good a sound system as you can.
Then you can go nto that word and have that experence.
THE DEATH OF FILM
A
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A
ICm through wth fm as a medum. For me, fm s dead. If you ook at what
peope a over the word are takng st pctures wth now, you begn to see
whatCs gong to happen.
ICm shootng n dgta vdeo and I ove t. I have a Web ste and I started dong
sma experments for the ste wth these sma cameras, at frst thnkng they were
|ust ke tte toys, and they were not very good. But then I started reazng that
theyCre very, very goodC"for me, at east.
A
You have forty-mnute takes, automatc focus. TheyCre ghtweght. And you can
see what youCve shot rght away. Wth fm you have to go nto the ab and you
donCt see what youCve shot unt the next day, but wth DV, as soon as
youCre done, you can put t nto the computer and go rght to work. And there
are so many toos. A thousand toos were born ths mornng, and thereC be ten
thousand new toos tomorrow. It happened frst n sound. Now everybodyCs got
ProToos, and you can manpuate these sounds, |ust fne-tune them unbeevaby
fast.The same thngCs happenng wth the mage. It gves you so much contro.
I started thnkng and expermentng. I dd some tests from DV to fm, because you
st have to transfer to fm to show n the theater. And athough t does not ook
exacty ke t was shot on fm, t ooks way better than I woud have thought.
Once you start workng n that word of DV wth sma, ghtweght equpment and
automatc focus, workng wth fm seems so cumbersome.These 35mm fm
cameras are startng to ook ke dnosaurs to me. TheyCre huge; they wegh
tons. And youCve got to move them around. There are so many thngs that have
to be done, and tCs a so sow. It ks a ot of possbtes. Wth DV everythng s
ghter; youCre more mobe. ItCs far more fud. You can thnk on your feet
and catch thngs.
And for actors, to get down nto a character n the mdde of a scene and then
suddeny have to stop whe we reoad the fm cameras after ten mnutesC"often,
ths breaks the thng. But now youCre rong aong; youCve got forty mnutes
down n there. And you can start takng to the actors, and nstead of stoppng t you
can move n and push t. You can even rehearse whe youCre shootng, athough
I start goofng up the soundtrack, because theyCve got to chop out a my words.
But many tmes I am takng to the actors whe we are shootng and we are abe to
get n deeper and deeper.
DV FOR YOUNG FILMMAKERS
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My advce s to use the opportunty DV brngs to do what you truy beeve n. Keep
your own voce. DonCt do anythng for the soe purpose of mpressng any studo
or some money peope. That aways seems to backfre, n my experence. ItCs
great to go to fm schoo, and you can get a ot of nteectua knowedge there, but
earn by dong. And now that costs have faen, you can reay go and do t on your
own. Then there are ots of fm festvas that you can enter and see f you can catch
some dstrbuton or fnanca hep ater on.
DV OUALITY
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The DV camera I currenty use s a Sony PD-150, whch s a ower quaty than HD.
And I love ths ower quaty. I ove the sma cameras.
The quaty remnds me of the fms of the 1930s. In the eary days, the emuson
wasnCt so good, so there was ess nformaton on the screen. The Sony PD resut
s a bt ke that; tCs nowhere near hgh-def. And sometmes, n a frame, f
thereCs some queston about what youCre seeng, or some dark corner, the
mnd can go dreamng. If everythng s crysta cear n that frame, thatCs what t
sC"thatCs all t s.
A
And hgh-def, unfortunatey, s so crysta cear. I saw a pece of fm on the screen n
my mxng room shot n hgh-def; t was some knd of scence fcton. And n the
background, I coud see wood screws n what was supposed to be a meta consoe.
ItCs gong to be far more dffcut to bud sets for hgh-def.
FUTURE OF CINEMA
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How we see fms s changng.The vdeo Pod and vdeos onne are changng
everythng. A tny tte pcture, nstead of a gant bg pcture, s gong to be how
peope see fms. And the good news: At east peope w have ther headphones.
Sound w become, I thnk, even more mportant. But then maybe you can put the
Pod n somethng and squrt the mage on a bg screen n your home, have
subwoofers and beautfu speaker systems and quetness n the house, so that you
can fa nto ths word.
The whoe thng s, when those curtans open, and the ghts go down, we must be
abe to go nto that word. And n many ways, tCs gettng very dffcut to go nto
a word. Peope tak so much n theaters. And thereCs a tny, crummy tte
pcture. How do you get that experence?
A
I thnk tCs gong to be a bt of a bumpy road. But the possbty s there for very
cean pcturesC"no scratches, no drt, no water marks, no tearngC"and an mage
that can be controed n an nfnte number of ways. If you take care of how you
show a fm, t can be a beautfu experence that ets you go nto a word.WeCre
st workng out ways for that to happen. But dgta s here; the vdeo Pod s here;
weCve |ust got to get rea and ro wth the fow.
COMMON SENSE
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Most of fmmakng s common sense. If you stay on your toes and thnk about how
to do a thng, tCs rght there.
ADVICE
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The Truth upholds the fragrant Earth and makes the living water wet.Truth makes fire burn and the air move,
makes the sun shine and all life grow. A hidden truth supports everything. Find it and win.
RAMAYANA
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Stay true to yoursef. Let your voce rng out, and donCt et anybody fdde wth
t. Never turn down a good dea, but never take a bad dea. And medtate. ItCs
very mportant to experence that Sef, that pure conscousness. ItCs reay
heped me. I thnk t woud hep any fmmaker. So start dvng wthn, envenng
that bss conscousness. Grow n happness and ntuton. Experence the |oy of
dong. And youC gow n ths peacefu way. Your frends w be very, very happy
wth you. Everyone w want to st next to you. And peope w gve you money!
SLEEP
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Seep s reay mportant. You need to rest the physoogy to be abe to work we
and medtate we. When I donCt get enough seep, my medtatons are duer.
You may even dp nto seep at the begnnng of your medtaton, because
youCre settng down. But f youCre we rested, youC have a cearer,
deeper experence.
A
Maybe even n a seepy medtaton youCre transcendng a tte. But tCs far
better to have a very cear, cean system as you go n. And when you dve, tCs
very powerfu, very deep.
A
When you medtate, the mnd settes down to that deepest eve, and the
physoogy settes down rght behnd t. And now, through ots of research, they
know that n that deepest state n medtaton, youCre gettng three tmes deeper
rest than that of the deepest seep. St, seep s mportant to prepare you to get to
that eve.
KEEP AT IT
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ItCs such a trcky busness. You want to do your art, but youCve got to ve. So
youCve got to have a |ob, and then sometmes youCre too tred to do your
art.
But f you ove what youCre dong, youCre gong to keep on dong t anyway.
ICve been very ucky. Aong the way, there are peope who hep us. ICve had
penty of those peope n my fe whoCve heped me go to the next step. And you
get that hep because youCve done somethng, so you have to keep dong t.
So much of what happened to me s good fortune. But I woud say: Try to get a |ob
that gves you some tme; get your seep and a tte bt of food; and work as much
as you can.ThereCs so much en|oyment n dong what you ove. Maybe ths w
open doors, and youC fnd a way to do what you ove. I hope you do.
SUCCESS AND FAILURE
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In some ways, the more fms youCve done, the easer t s to make one. You
become famar wth the process of catchng an dea and transatng that dea. You
understand the toos and the ghtng. You understand the whoe
processC"youCve been through t before.
A
But tCs aso harder, because when you reease another fm, tCs seen n
context of what youCve aready done. ItCs gong to be |udged based on that.
And f youCve |ust come off somethng successfu, you fee that you may take
the fa.
But f youCve come down from somethng very ow, as I dd after Dune, there
may be zero fearC"you fee you canCt get any ower. You may experence ths
euphora and freedom that you have nothng to ose.
You have to earn to fnd baance n success and faure. Success can k you |ust as
faure can. And the ony way to have baance n success and faure s to functon on
that Unfed Fed eve. ThereCs your frend. You canCt fake tC"youCre
ether n that fed or youCre not. And when that fed s fuy envened, you
canCt ose, no matter what happens.
GONE FISHING, AGAIN
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Curving back upon My own Nature,
l create again and again.
8HACAVAD - ClTA
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When you fnsh a pro|ect, thereCs a good feeng to t, but thereCs somethng
of a vacuum, too. YouCve been puttng a your attenton on that, and then
tCs done.
ItCs ke fshng. You caught a beautfu fsh yesterday, and youCre out today
wth the same bat, and youCre wonderng f youCre gong to catch another.
But f you carry on the anaogy of fshng, sometmes, even f you st wth ots and
ots of patence, no fsh come. YouCre n the wrong area. And so maybe you ree
n the hook, get the padde, and move to another pace. That means you eave the
char where youCre daydreamng or you move on to another thng. |ust by
changng somethng, the desre often gets fufed.
It doesnCt mean that f you |ust st and wat that t w come. I donCt know
qute what brngs t. But the desre, f tCs kept ave, w often be vadated wth
an dea. When you get an dea, you know youCve got a vadaton.
COMPASSION
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5ofter than the flower where kindness is concerned,
5tronger than the thunder where principles are at stake.
VEDlC DE5CRlPTlON OF THE ENLlCHTENED
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Medtaton s not a sefsh thng. Even though youCre dvng n and experencng
the Sef, youCre not cosng yoursef off from the word. YouCre strengthenng
yoursef, so that you can be more effectve when you go back out nto the word.
ItCs ke they say on arpanes: CoFrst put your mask on, and then hep those
next to you put thers on.C My frend Chare Lutes used to say, CoThereCs a !
guy cryng on the curb, and you st down to comfort hm, and pretty soon
thereCs two guys cryng on the curb.C!
So compasson, apprecaton for others, and the capacty to hep others are
enhanced when you medtate. You start dvng down and experencng ths ocean of
pure ove, pure peaceC"you coud say pure compasson. You experence that, and
know t by beng t. Then you go out nto the word, and you can reay do
somethng for peope.
CONSCIOUSNESS - BASED EDUCATION
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One of the man thngs that got me takng pubcy about Transcendenta
Medtaton was seeng the dfference t can make to kds. Kds are sufferng. Stress
s now httng them at a younger and younger age, at |ust about the tme they get
out of the crb. And there are a these dfferent earnng dsorders that I never even
heard about before.
A
At the same tme, I saw the resuts of conscousness-based educaton, whch s
educaton that deveops the fu potenta of the human beng. ItCs the same
educaton everyone receves, wth the added bonus that the student earns to dve
wthn and unfod that Sef, that pure conscousness.
ThereCs a schoo prncpa, Dr. George Rutherford, n Washngton, D.C., who has
ntroduced Transcendenta Medtaton nto three schoos. Before that, the schoos
were fed wth voence:There were shootngs, sucdes, and voence. But he got
the staff medtatng, got the teachers medtatng, got the students medtatng, and
watched t a turn around.
A
ThereCs another prncpa, Carmen NCNamd, n Detrot, who ntroduced
Transcendenta Medtaton n her schoo, Natak Tabah, about nne years ago.The
kds medtate ten mnutes n the mornng together, ten mnutes n the afternoon,
and the schoo s a bssfu schoo.Those kds are happer, gettng better grades, and
gong out and experencng a knds of success.
A
ItCs somethng that works. You take n more nteectua knowedge durng schoo
because tCs so much fun. But youCre aso expandng the contaner of that
knowedge. You contrast that wth what norma educaton produces, whch s a |oke.
ItCs facts and fgures, but the knower does not know hm- or hersef.
One nght I saw a pay at Maharsh Schoo n IowaC"a schoo that has
conscousness-based educaton. It was a cod and rany nght, and when I was tod I
was gong to see a hgh schoo pay, I thought,CoMan, tCs gong to be a very
ong nght.C I was sttng n the mdde of ths tte theater, a beautfu tte !
theater, and out on stage came the students. They werenCt professona actors;
they were |ust kds puttng on a pay. But I was never more bown away. I thought t
was better than a Broadway producton, because what I saw was conscousness on
these facesC"a vey, gowng conscousness. They had such ntegence and
tmng, and ther humor was rght on the money. You donCt worry about students
ke that.TheyCre sef-suffcent.TheyCre gong to do fne n the word and
theyCre gong to make the word better by beng n t.
My foundaton, the Davd Lynch Foundaton for Conscousness-Based Educaton and
Word Peace, was set up to hep more kds get that knd of experence.WeCve
rased money and gven t to schoos a over the country for thousands and
thousands of students to earn to medtate. And tCs amazng to see kds who do
ths. Stress |ust doesnCt catch them; tCs ke water off a duckCs back.
A
I want to do ths not ony for those studentsC sake, for ther own growth of
conscousness, but for a of us, because we are ke ghtbubs. And, ke ghtbubs,
we can en|oy that brghter ght of conscousness wthn, and aso radate t. I
beeve that the key to peace s n ths.
If there were ten thousand new medtatng students, t woud affect ths country. It
woud be ke a wave of peace. ItCs harmony, coherenceC"rea peace. In the
ndvdua, that ght of conscousness drves negatvty further and further away. In
the word, t can do the same thng.
REAL PEACE
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Avert the danger that has not yet come.
YOCA 5UTRA5
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Peope are so convnced we canCt have peace that tCs a |oke now.
Somebody wns a beauty pageant, and the |oke s, she wants word peace. And
everybody has a bg augh. Nobody beeves n peace. ItCs a nce dea. But
thatCs a t sC"|ust a sweet-tte-od-ady dea. ItCs meanngess. ItCs
never gong to happen. And we ve n ths hehoe, and we thnk tCs got to be
ths way.
A
But what f weCre wrong?
We know that n one human beng, when you ramp up conscousnessC"when you
ramp up that ght of untyC"negatve thngs begn to recede. In that ndvdua,
you see more and more ntegence, more and more creatvty, more and more
bss, negatvty gong away, and a postve nfuence pourng out nto the word. So
f there were many, many medtators, t woud be beautfu. But even wthout that,
sma groups of advanced medtators coud st make a huge dfference.
A
The theory s that f the square root of 1 percent of the wordCs popuaton, or
8,000 peope, practces advanced medtaton technques n a group, then that
group, accordng to pubshed research, s quadratcay more powerfu than the
same number scattered about.
A
These peace-creatng groups have been formed for short-term studes. And every
tme the advanced medtators got together n a group, they dramatcay affected
the area around them.They measuraby reduced crme and voence. How dd they
do that?
There s a fed of unty wthn everyone. ItCs aways been there. ItCs
unbounded, nfnte, and eterna. ItCs that eve of fe that never had a
begnnng. It s, and t w be, forever. And t can be envened. In the human beng,
the envenng of that fed eads to enghtenmentC"the fu potenta of the
ndvdua. In the word, the resut of envenng unty by a peace-creatng group
woud be rea peace on earth.
IN CLOSING
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ICd ke to say: I deepy ove fm; I ove catchng deas; and I ove to medtate. I
ove envenng unty. And I thnk the envenng of unty brngs a better and better
fe. Maybe enghtenment s far away, but tCs sad that when you wak toward
the ght, wth every step, thngs get brghter. Every day, for me, gets better and
better. And I beeve that envenng unty n the word w brng peace on earth. So I
say: Peace to a of you.
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May everyone be happy. May everyone be free of dsease.
May auspcousness be seen everywhere. May sufferng beong to no one.
Peace.
CODA: TRUE HAPPINESS LIES WITHIN
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Rght now ICm catchng some pantng fsh. And some musc fsh. I havenCt
caught the next fm fsh yet. I |ust try to catch deasC"and sometmes I fa n ove
wth one and then I know what I want to do. It has nothng to do wth money; |ust
wth transatng that dea.
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After lNLAND EMPlRE, peope asked me whether I woud dstrbute a fm agan
mysef. And, wth a team, I woud for sure. Lkewse, I reman competey commtted
to shootng n dgta vdeo. DV s |ust ke fm, wthout the probems. We ve n a
dgta word now, and I ove tC"ICm never gong back to fm. So far as the
reacton to lNLAND EMPlRE, t went, I thnk, ke t does for a ot of fms: It was
hated by some and oved by some. And t made a dscusson.The bogs were vey.
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I do beeve fm students themseves are gong dgta. Of course, fm students w
aways experence a yearnng to make at east one fm usng fm, |ust to have done
t, |ust to have been n that word. But after dong that, I thnk, they w qucky
return to the dgta word.
Lookng ahead, I am commtted to my work wth the Foundaton.We want to hep
the rapdy growng number of schoos that are askng for programs n medtaton.
And the word s gong around that dvng wthn reay changes thngs for the good.
It s not somethng that |ust comes and goesC"when you gve students ths
technque, thngs reay start changng. And they have that technque for the rest of
ther ves. I see that peope are comng to reaze that t s |ust so beautfu: ths
dve wthn, ths transcendng, and ths experence of the Unfed Fed, where
everythng comes from. It s a Fed of pure bss conscousness, absoute
ntegence, and nfnte creatvty.
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Everythng I experence today brngs me back agan and agan to where I started:
True happness es wthn.
SELECT FILMOGRAPHY
Eraserhead (1977)
The Elephant Man (1980)
8lue Velvet (1986)
Wild at Heart (1990)
Twin Peaks (1990-1991)
Lost Highway (1997)
The 5traight 5tory (1999)
Mulholland Drive (2001)
lNLAND EMPlRE (2006)
SOURCES OUOTED
Ramayana. Retod by Wam Buck. Unversty of Caforna Press, 1976.
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Eternal 5tories from the Upanishads. Thomas Egenes and Kumuda Reddy. Smrt
Books, 2002.
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Maharishi Mahesh Yogi on the 8hagavad-Cita: A New Translation and Commentary,
Chapters J-6.
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Internatona SRM Pubcatons, 1967. Pengun Books, 1969.
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MaharishiCs Absolute Theory of Defence. Maharsh Mahesh Yog. Age of
Enghtenment Pubcatons, 1996.
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The Upanishads. Transated by Astar Shearer and Peter Russe. Harper & Row,
1978.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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Three-tme Oscar-nomnated drector Davd Lynch s among the eadng fmmakers
of our era. From the eary seventes to the present day, LynchCs popuar and
crtcay accamed fm pro|ects, whch ncude Eraserhead, The Elephant Man,
Wild at Heart, Twin Peaks, 8lue Velvet, Mulholland Drive, and lNLAND EMPlRE, are
nternatonay consdered to have broken down the wa between art-house cnema
and Hoywood movemakng.
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You can vst the Davd Lynch Foundaton for Conscousness-Based Educaton and
Word Peace at
www.DavdLynchFoundaton.org
. The authorCs proceeds from the sae of ths book go to the foundaton for the
purpose of provdng fundng for n-schoo programs n Transcendenta Medtaton.
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