TWIN PEAKS, episode 002 (David Lynch, 1990)

David Lynch once said, "This world is wild at heart and weird on top." He conveys this to the audience of his show, Twin Peaks. The weirdness and the wildness are unquestionably expressed through Lynch's choice of mise-en-scène. Three different choices for rooms and their interior design were made, seemingly at random, by Lynch.

The first scene of the show is an apparently wealthy family, judging from the size of the room and the costume of the characters, eating dinner. The room has a large fire stone fireplace reminiscent of a wealthy hunting lodge with wild tribal paintings on the walls. The bizarreness of the room's interior seems to be a conscious choice on Lynch's part to express not only the wealth of the family, but also the sort of primitive motives and values the family's actions are based upon. This can be proved by the two brothers' journey to the brothel, a decision made based upon primitive lust.

Brothels are expected to have rich or at least appear to have a decadent, lush interior. In the world Lynch is creating, bordellos are half lavish and half cabin in the woods. The end of the room with the bar is in the wilderness/cabin style, and the other half is hanging satin or silk cloth of different shades of red and pink. The atmosphere Lynch creates is a wild, outdoorsy, lascivious house of ill repute.

The third room with a similar theme is Special Agent Cooper's hotel room. It is a cabin, hunting lodge theme complete with the animal hooves holding a hunting rifle over the headboard of the bed. There is nothing that less suits Agent Cooper's suave, put-together, but slightly goofy character. Lynch makes the room work though! It is exactly that sort of conflict that lends the show the bizarre and unbalanced feel Lynch is going for.

You expect a brothel, you find a western bar. You anticipate a nice hotel room but find a hunting lodge instead. A wealthy family would logically live in a fancy, hoity-toity mansion right? Nope! Lynch serves you a tribal version of a cabin with absurd paintings on the wall. Lynch is definitely keeping things "weird on top" with his choice of mise-en-scène.

In David Lynch’s direction of episode 002 of Twin Peaks, he attempts to create an atmosphere of pseudo-normalcy in an obviously peculiar town. His mise-en-scène, depicting a seemingly ordinary mountain community, directly contradicts the bizarre plot of the show. This pattern of everyday commonality juxtaposed against completely ridiculous behavior characterizes the overall mood of this anything-but-average drama.

The first example of this paradoxical arrangement occurs in the very first scene. It opens on an apparently typical lodge setting complete with beautiful wood paneling and a stone fireplace merrily flickering in the background. A group of stately looking people are gathered around a long dining table. However, randomly, a Native American man is sitting cross-legged in the foreground of the shot. This strange, out-of-place character is never explained in the duration of the show. In addition, the odd character of Jerry enters wearing sunglasses, a bright blue shirt, suspenders, and a checkered bow tie, appearing completely foreign to his nicely dressed companions.

Another example of a regular façade covering a completely abnormal situation is seen in the character of Agent Cooper. Superficially, he seems to be an average, small-town detective who may be trying a little too hard to look the part. He wears a tan trench coat, a white collared shirt, a thin black tie, black pants, dress shoes, and has his jet-black hair neatly slicked back with every hair in place. However, the viewer soon discovers that he is somewhat of an eccentric kook who follows instructions from a dream in order to try to solve a murder mystery.

A final instance of Lynch’s strange use of mise-en-scène occurs when the viewer is introduced to Ed’s household. It appears to be a perfectly comfortable, peaceful environment with its peach walls and its cream and pink flowered wallpaper. However, the viewer is almost immediately drawn into the unbearable ambiance created by his overbearing wife. She constantly nags her poor husband to the extent that he understandably doesn’t want to be anywhere near her or her suffocatingly clean house.

Obviously, David Lynch strives for and achieves a sense of a small town gone wrong. Without some balance of normalcy, this show would seem a little too over-the-top, but through his innovative use of mise-en-scène, he establishes an adequate balance between the sickeningly normal and the downright absurd.

Throughout the second episode of Twin Peaks, the viewer is barraged with a non sequitur juxtaposition of soap opera drama (characteristic of rich families being watched by stay at home mothers wishing for that kind of life) and a small logging town reminiscent of Northern Exposure that appeals to disgruntled teens and manly men.

There are many scripted parts of the show that reveal the cold, backwoods characteristic of the town, such as totem poles, log cabins, and men wearing plaid flannel shirts. There are, however, other parts which were probably unscripted but purposely chosen by director David Lynch.

Inside the diner, while Ed orders a cup of coffee at the bar, there are two old men sitting behind him. Both wear plaid shirts with vest coats, but the most prominent parts of their costumes are their fishing hats. The lighting outside of the coffee shop indicates that it is late morning or early afternoon. Two geriatrics sit inside a coffee shop in their fishing gear obviously not embarking on a fishing excursion. They fit perfectly in the drab coffee shop at that time of day (even wearing their fishing hats), though, because it makes the place feel like it is on the intersection of a wide spot on the highway, a good ol’ homeboy place where folks are nice and everyone knows everyone else.

While Agent Cooper is out in the woods with three police officers and a receptionist, a table sits with them practically filled to the edges with what looked like 4 dozen donuts for 5 people. While donuts are typical of any crime scene investigated by police officers, so many donuts look ridiculous. The presence of the donuts (and in such excess) screams small town force trying to impress and accommodate the FBI Agent in their pine forest town.

The final and most important unscripted act of mise-en-scène in this episode lasts just a split second when the camera sits outside the diner. Lynch could have picked any two seconds of scenery and traffic filmed by a camera on a tripod outside the diner, but the two seconds he did pick had a large logging truck driving by the diner. A truck loaded with full size pine trees for lumber does not drive down Any Road, U.S.A.; it drives down small rural municipalities that make livings off of forestry, reside in log cabins, and have front porches with screen doors.

Through the entire melodrama of love affairs, murders, out-of-towners, love interests, over-reactions, and arguments (all usually only afforded by the affluent), log cabins and town folk are abundant. Via such situational irony, David Lynch implements impeccable mise-en-scène to constantly remind the viewer of the absurdity that is this drama.

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Last update: 8/27/2004