10 Mind Meltingly Surreal Films

4. Eraserhead (1977)

First surreal film from David Lynch, the film showcases his wonderfully skewed imagination and creative vision. Henry Spencer walks home with his groceries to his squalid appartment. He goes to have dinner with girlfriend Mary X and her family. The mother informs him that Mary has had his child and they must marry. Mary goes to live with Henry It is debatable that she has had a 'child'. It is a weird looking creature that never shuts its little yap crying. This drives Mary to desertion and Henry to hallucinations of a woman behind the radiator stomping on a replica of his kid. He has a sexual dalliance with the Beautiful Girl Across the Hall. More hallucinations follow for Henry including his head falling from the sky and cracking on the pavement. A little boy picks it up and brings it to a factory to be turned into erasers. After the Beautiful Girl Across the Hall turns her apartment into a knocking shop, Henry gets depressed and cuts the squalling infant's swaddling open. The baby falls to bits and there is a highly surreal hallucinatory climax to the whole affair. The film is said to be the result of Lynch's fear of fatherhood as his daughter Jennifer came along unexpectedly and had severe clubbed feet. He also lived in a hellish urban area in Philadelphia - and this was a distinct influence on the horrific city landscape that Henry Spencer lives in. The film was in production limbo for years but Nance kept his trademark hairdo all of that time because he was so committed to the project. The use of sound in the film is very important in lending it a stark, nightmarish feel. Eraserhead did not receive the best of reviews when it was released, many critics thought it was too disgusting to merit any consideration as a good film. Opinion has changed over time and Eraserhead has been granted the accolades it deserves, but rather infuriatingly, Lynch refuses to clarify certain aspects of the film that are out there in terms of surreal content and we are left to wonder whether the woman behind the radiator is his subconscious or not and other such mysteries within the movie.