Disappointed w/ "Catching the Big Fish"

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Marty1918
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Disappointed w/ "Catching the Big Fish"

Post by Marty1918 »

I was very excited going into Barnes & Noble to buy the new Lynch book the day it came out, but my excitment faded rather quickly as I started thumbing through it. Is anyone else disappointed? Sparse on content and insight, it's much more rewarding to surf the net for Lynch interviews than to read through this book. I love all things Lynch, but I actually passed on purchasing.
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Teopeaks
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Post by Teopeaks »

I would say "Catching The Big Fish" is good but could have been much better, but you could say that about many things, in my opinion, like the "Blue Bob" CD, the book "Images", "Darkened Room" etc. Still I enjoy going through those things from time to time. I think Lynch remains a master when it comes to films, and that's what he does best. The rest is good but not as good, disappointing sometimes.
oospool
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Catching the Big Fish

Post by oospool »

Listening to David reciting the book is better than reading it. I agree, it is sparse, but take a walk in the woods with a pod and listen, it comes through.
knowthyself
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Post by knowthyself »

I love the way the book reads. I think anyone going in expecting this book to somehow reveal everything to them well its just not ever going to happen. Instead it read the way he speaks, simple but truthfull, insightful and honest. I think the little tid bits on every topic are all he needed to say and he says alot with very little.
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dugpa
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Post by dugpa »

I enjoyed it quite a bit but was disappointed that FWWM wasn't mentioned. Based on an interview it turns out that it was an oversight and not intentional.
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Annie
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Post by Annie »

I've heard elsewhere that listening to the book is more fun than reading it. I love to hear David speak, even if it's about meditation!
Keep your eye on the doughnut, not on the hole.
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goodguyseatpie
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Post by goodguyseatpie »

I enjoyed the book for what it is. At first, as I flipped through it, I was disappointed. I mean, how many books written by celebrities are very long? I thought this would be another one of those short ego books. But then I thought about Lynch and his style. He's a minimalist at heart. He's reluctant to be wordy about anything. The book has some filler, for sure (perhaps not in Lynch's mind). But it also has some nice stories, like how he collaborates with Angelo Badalamenti. Lynch makes some very direct points about the future of film and I especially like his criticism of high-definition.

I haven't listened to the audio version of the book, but I will at some point. The book wasn't terribly expensive, so in the end I'm not complaining.
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moviemaker
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Post by moviemaker »

Annie wrote:I've heard elsewhere that listening to the book is more fun than reading it. I love to hear David speak, even if it's about meditation!
Annie you are correct!

I have the audio book and it is fantastic when David reads it!

Perfect for listening to in my ipod/car when I'm stuck in LA traffic!

peace.
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Red Room
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Post by Red Room »

moviemaker wrote:
Annie wrote:I've heard elsewhere that listening to the book is more fun than reading it. I love to hear David speak, even if it's about meditation!
Annie you are correct!

I have the audio book and it is fantastic when David reads it!

Perfect for listening to in my ipod/car when I'm stuck in LA traffic!
I echo those sentiments... although you can substitute the LA traffic for congested UK roads ;-)
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grrlskout
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Post by grrlskout »

I have to concur with several of you that listening to the book is AMAZING!!!!

I listened to it on my ipod while on the Amtrak train to Chicago to see David present INLAND EMPIRE...... and how amazing was THAT!?!?!!

Listening to him speak like that.... inspired me in more ways than I can possibly explain.
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LostInTheMovies
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Re:

Post by LostInTheMovies »

dugpa wrote:I enjoyed it quite a bit but was disappointed that FWWM wasn't mentioned. Based on an interview it turns out that it was an oversight and not intentional.
Ok this is years later obviously, but just saw this now. That exclusion - especially in the filmography - always bothered me so I'm glad to read it was unintentional. You don't happen to remember where that interview was, do you?
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tmurry
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Re: Disappointed w/ "Catching the Big Fish"

Post by tmurry »

I think this is very much a format thing. The experience reminds me of "This is Water," the David Foster Wallace book that is (in essence) an attempt to monetize a commencement speech that he had given at Kenyon Collage, transcripts of which on the Internet had hit many (myself included) like a bolt of lightening. It was a moving and transformative talk, that read in blog text as a powerful persuasive essay that prompted much soul searching about what a life well lived was. It was a very anti-"life in a bubble" plea that, as a culture, we need to be taught more. But for the book, the speech was cut up into little cutlets of meaning, distributing maybe 8 standard hardback pages of content over (Amazon says) 137 sparse pages, in a similar arrangement to Big Fish.

I had read the talk many times, and it never failed to give me goosepimples. But when I got and read it in the book form, it left me cold even though it was ostensibly the same thing. Something about the self help psalm collection/children's book setting robbed it of its gravitas. When I read Big Fish, I got that deja vu so palpably that I adjusted to try and read the words in a decontextualized way, and I got a good deal out of it that way.

Part of this is probably consumer distrust, that someone is fluffing up the content to milk you for money so a subconscious wariness creeps in. Part is that it resembles physically books you roll your eyes at. Part is that it puts so much weight on a single sentence "counting" if its the only one on the page that even pretty pithy stuff looks a bit banal in relation to expectation. Part of it the isolation of ideas makes you read it in a way that hampers the flow so that you don't get the momentum of profundity accruing.

I just think the format reeks of trying to fluff up an essay or interview content, that people might find life changing, into a format that doesn't suit it and loosing a lot of people in the process.
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