The Bob/Leland relationship

[LostInTheMovies]

I've noticed that a central point of contention for a lot of fans (and some critics) of Fire Walk With Me is the nature of the relationship between Bob and Leland. Is Bob a psychological construct? Is he a real spiritual being? Is Leland responsible for Bob's actions as well? Is he simply a helpless puppet? Is he aware of what Bob is doing with his "vessel"? Or is he unconscious of everything Bob does in his body?

Of course all these questions are laid out in episode 16 (which encourages us to see Leland exclusively as a victim of Bob but also contains numerous subtle openings for a more complex reading), indeed very explicitly laid out in the final scene. But Fire Walk With Me obviously throws many new questions - and suggestions - into the mix.

My take is that Bob certainly exists as a spiritual entity in the world of Twin Peaks, and not just inside Laura's head (for that to work, we'd have to disregard the series completely and even then the movie contains ample evidence that, as Laura puts it, "Bob IS real!"). However, I do not see Leland is simply a helpless victim of Bob but rather a kind of collaborator. The film suggests very strongly on several occasions - Leland's flashbacks with Teresa Banks, the confrontation with the one-armed man in traffic, and of course the final statement "I always thought you knew it was me!" - that Leland is aware of, even a participant in, what he does under Bob's sway and thus bears some responsibility for it (and not just for a decision to let him in when he was a child, something that he obviously can't be held accountable for).

Another question, I've noticed, is not just what evidence people take from the film and series but what they WANT to be true. Understandably, many fans don't want Leland to be responsible for Bob's actions: either because he's a favorite character, or because it seems inconsistent with what the series suggests, or because this makes the abuse of Laura feel all too sordid and real taking the film out of the realm of entertaining fantasy. On the other hand, many fans do want him to be responsible (even to the extent of denying Bob's actual existence) because they feel it makes the film more serious in both approach and subject - if it's a story of real-world incest and abuse rather than supernatural possession it has a more powerful point to make in their eyes.

I can kind of understand both points of view since I clung to the Bob-controls-Leland explanation while viewing the series but felt this trivialized the matter after watching the film. Personally - and putting aside the actual evidence for a moment - here's why I PREFER my reading (Leland as responsible for and aware of his "Bob" actions):

1. It is dramatically far more compelling. If Leland's only mistake was to let a demon inside him as an innocent child, and since then he's just gone blank whenever Bob jerks the chains, his character ceases to be very interesting. A passive vessel, with no choice, is always going to be less dynamic than an active character who has choices to make, choices driven (in this case) by desire, denial, and desperation. As a corollary to this, Laura's struggle to resist Bob becomes much more powerful if we realize that her father has made, and continues to make, a real choice NOT to resist evil.

2. It is much more consistent with Lynch's work in which presences like the Mystery Man, the Creature Behind the Diner, and the Phantom have both a literal presence within the film's world and a psychological importance. When viewers read Lynch's films as either straight-up fantasies or straight-up metaphors I think they miss the point: they are psychodramas. Lynch purposefully blurs the line between realism & the supernatural for a reason: by doing so, he's able to simultaneously retain both the startling power of the inexplicable and the resonance of allegory, which is no mean feat and partly explains why his movies are so singularly powerful. I think Fire Walk With Me very much starts the trend that continues with Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive, and Inland Empire.

3. It lives up to the power and strength of the material Lynch has presented. Viewing the film as a story of incest and sexual abuse is not simply an "intellectual" decision as some have alleged, it's a virtually unavoidable visceral response to the way Lynch directs the material (and Sheryl Lee performs it). To then try to explain one's way out of this gut reaction by removing Leland's guilt/responsibility, something I initially worried the film was trying to do on my first viewing, undermines the raw emotional power of the scenes when taken on their own terms. Then it would seem the movie is using the upsetting and unsettling imagery and theme of abuse - something all too real - simply to provide entertainment rather than insight. Which is not only a glib thing to do but seems to me rather inconsistent with Lynch's general approach and outlook.

That said, I'm curious to hear others' reactions. Not only what you make of the Bob/Leland relationship, but what is the evidence, and most importantly, does your own reading work for you (or do you wish the film/series had gone in another direction)? This is in many ways to be the central question of the Twin Peaks mythology.

[Fernanda]

Is Bob a psychological construct?

Leland stops when he sees them. He divides. One half becomes Bob -
opaque. The other half floats up and becomes Leland - transparent.

"The 'autonomy' of the psychological subject is, of course, an ideological lure that results from the 'opaqueness of alienated objectivity': the individual's impotence in the face of social objectivity is ideologically inverted into the glorification of the monadological subject. The notion of a 'psycho­logical' subject, of an 'unconscious' reservoir of drives independent of social mediation, is thus unquestionably the ideological effect of social contradictions."

http://pt.scribd.com/doc/50255743/1994- ... -Enjoyment

"(...) A condensed version of the entire critical appropriation of psychoanalysis by the Frankfurt School. The notion of psychology at work in psychoanalysis is ultimately a negative one: the domain of the 'psychological' comprises all those factors which dominate the individual's 'inner life ' behind his back, in the guise of an 'irrational', heteronomous force which eludes his conscious control. Consequently, the aim of the psychoanalytic process is that 'what is id should become ego ' - that is, 'man should be emancipated from the heteronomous rule of his unconscious'. (Leland "into the light") Such a free, autonomous subject would be, stricto sensu, a subject without psychology (Bob) - in other words, psychoanalysis aims to 'de-psychologize' the subject."

http://www.dugpa.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... zed#p30510

In this context, Leland is Bob's "psychology made flesh". The more we "psychoanalyse" Leland's actions, the more Real (personalized/de-psychologized) Bob becomes.

[LostInTheMovies]

Is Bob a psychological construct?

Leland stops when he sees them. He divides. One half becomes Bob -
opaque. The other half floats up and becomes Leland - transparent.

"The 'autonomy' of the psychological subject is, of course, an ideological lure that results from the 'opaqueness of alienated objectivity', the individual's impotence in the face of social objectivity is ideologically inverted into the glorification of the monadological subject. The notion of a 'psycho­logical' subject, of an 'unconscious' reservoir of drives independent of
social mediation , is thus unquestionably the ideological effect of social contradictions."

"(...) A condensed version of the entire critical appropriation of psychoanalysis by the Frankfurt School. The notion of
psychology at work in psychoanalysis is ultimately a negative one: the domain of the 'psychological' comprises all those factors which dominate the individual's 'inner life ' behind his back, in the guise of an 'irrational', heteronomous force which eludes his conscious control. Consequently, the aim of the psychoanalytic process is that 'what is id should become ego ' - that is, 'man should be emancipated from the heteronomous rule of his unconscious'. (Cooper's "Into the Light" speech) Such a free, autonomous subject would be, stricto sensu, a subject without psychology (Bob) - in other words, psychoanalysis aims to 'de-psychologize' the subject."

http://www.dugpa.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... zed#p30510

In this context, Leland is Bob's "psychology made flesh". The more we "psychoanalyse" Leland's actions, the more Real (personalized/de-psychologized) Bob becomes.

This reminds me a bit (well, more than a bit) of Grace Zabriskie's character's speech in Inland Empire: "A little boy went out to play. When he opened his door, he saw the world. As he passed through the doorway, he caused a reflection. Evil was born. Evil was born, and followed the boy."

[Fernanda]

COOPER: The very fact that we are talking about word association means we are in a space that was opened up by our practice of word association. The world is a hologram, Albert.

For example, the more we perceive Cronenberg's Spider as a textbook Oedipal trajectory, the more doubtful it becomes whether he commited the murder or not. Although that was intentional on Cronenberg's part (he says so on the DVD commentary) he arrives at the same place as Lynch (subconsciously) does. "(...) the awful wonder of the riddle at the heart of Laura's death is augumented, not deminished, by knowledge." http://www.dugpa.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=2618. Lynch would quote from the Upanishads at the beginning of screenings of INLAND EMPIRE: "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."

[harmolodic]

This is all great stuff. But I think we are making it more complex than it is.

I also think that a common feminist criticism--the writers let Leland off the hook and thus do a disservice to rape and incest victims--misses the mark.

Bob is, and isn't, "real," within the artistic construct of Twin Peaks. He's a free-floating signifier, as I believe Martha Nochimson has referred to him. We have to hold both of those ideas in mind at the same time. The truth being told is a metaphorical truth. Leland is, and to a certain extent, isn't, responsible for his actions. The central metaphor of TP is the cycle of sexual abuse. Leland makes it very clear, in almost unbearably literal language, that he was sexually abused as a boy. Many individuals who were abused as children go on to become abusers themselves: this is the cycle of Twin Peaks, the spinning fan. So we can be horrified at Leland's actions but still realize that his own experiences essentially turned him into a monster. He can feel remorse and guilt but is powerless to halt his obsessive, programmed behavior.

Of course, Laura has also, through her own abuse, begun to portray programmed behavior--she humiliates and mocks Bobby and others, and at one point reveals her "true face" to Harold. She's begun the cycle as well.

I find it much easier to accept Leland on this metaphorical level than to try to reason out whether he's guilty or innocent of his actions.

[LostInTheMovies]

This is all great stuff. But I think we are making it more complex than it is.

I also think that a common feminist criticism--the writers let Leland off the hook and thus do a disservice to rape and incest victims--misses the mark.

Bob is, and isn't, "real," within the artistic construct of Twin Peaks. He's a free-floating signifier, as I believe Martha Nochimson has referred to him. We have to hold both of those ideas in mind at the same time. The truth being told is a metaphorical truth. Leland is, and to a certain extent, isn't, responsible for his actions. The central metaphor of TP is the cycle of sexual abuse. Leland makes it very clear, in almost unbearably literal language, that he was sexually abused as a boy. Many individuals who were abused as children go on to become abusers themselves: this is the cycle of Twin Peaks, the spinning fan. So we can be horrified at Leland's actions but still realize that his own experiences essentially turned him into a monster. He can feel remorse and guilt but is powerless to halt his obsessive, programmed behavior.

Of course, Laura has also, through her own abuse, begun to portray programmed behavior--she humiliates and mocks Bobby and others, and at one point reveals her "true face" to Harold. She's begun the cycle as well.

Totally agreed with this.

I find it much easier to accept Leland on this metaphorical level than to try to reason out whether he's guilty or innocent of his actions.

I think the best way of putting it, for me at least, is less guilt/innocence than responsibility. As Lynch put it, "the war inside the father." I think for Lynch, especially in his later films, it's less about judgment than awareness. His characters rise and fall based not on mistakes they make but their ability to face up to the truth and acquire full knowledge of themselves and their situation. Laura Palmer, Alvin Straight, and Nikki Grace are successful in this endeavor. Leland Palmer, Fred Madison, and Diane Selwyn (I think) are not.

[harmolodic]

I think the best way of putting it, for me at least, is less guilt/innocence than responsibility. As Lynch put it, "the war inside the father." I think for Lynch, especially in his later films, it's less about judgment than awareness. His characters rise and fall based not on mistakes they make but their ability to face up to the truth and acquire full knowledge of themselves and their situation. Laura Palmer, Alvin Straight, and Nikki Grace are successful in this endeavor. Leland Palmer, Fred Madison, and Diane Selwyn (I think) are not.

Exactly! Where do you think Eraserhead's Henry fits in that continuum?

Have you read the new Nochimson book? To my thinking she's the best Lynch critic writing today. I read her first essay on Lynch some 20 years ago (!) after becoming a rabid fan of the series during its original run, and then The Passion of David Lynch, which is pure brilliance. She has the most coherent explanation of Judy--and why the monkey whispers the name--of any critic I've read.

I dig your blog, by the way. Keep it up. Great stuff.

[LostInTheMovies]

I think the best way of putting it, for me at least, is less guilt/innocence than responsibility. As Lynch put it, "the war inside the father." I think for Lynch, especially in his later films, it's less about judgment than awareness. His characters rise and fall based not on mistakes they make but their ability to face up to the truth and acquire full knowledge of themselves and their situation. Laura Palmer, Alvin Straight, and Nikki Grace are successful in this endeavor. Leland Palmer, Fred Madison, and Diane Selwyn (I think) are not.

Exactly! Where do you think Eraserhead's Henry fits in that continuum?

Have you read the new Nochimson book? To my thinking she's the best Lynch critic writing today. I read her first essay on Lynch some 20 years ago (!) after becoming a rabid fan of the series during its original run, and then The Passion of David Lynch, which is pure brilliance. She has the most coherent explanation of Judy--and why the monkey whispers the name--of any critic I've read.

I dig your blog, by the way. Keep it up. Great stuff.

Yes, I love her books! David Lynch Swerves is very compelling as well although I wish she'd devote a whole chapter to FWWM in there too - since I think that's the film where Lynch's quantum/Vedic thing really gets going. Her, John Thorne, Brett Steven Abelman, and Christy Desmet are the writers whose interpretations of the film have most shaped mine at this point. (I also love David Foster Wallace's take on the movie although in that case I discovered the essay only after I had drawn similar conclusions.)

Henry is a fascinating case. On the one hand, as Nochimson and others have pointed out, Henry prefigured later Lynch heroes by exposing secrets and destroying his limitations. And yet he does so by exercising power and violence over a creature more helpless than he is. So in some ways he prefigured Nikki Grace in Inland Empire but in other ways he prefigured the Phantom. Another way of putting it: the ends of Eraserhead and Fire Walk With Me are mirrors: in both, the central character discovers the truth and breaks through material limitations to be greeted by their angel. But in the first ilm, that protagonist is the abusive parent while in the second it is the abused child. A very significant reversal, and one that I think only Diane Stevenson has noted.

Thanks for the compliment, btw. In the coming months I will be posting interviews with both Thorne and Nochimson, so stay tuned. Did you see her recent article on David Chase? Caused quite a stir though its critics seemed to miss the point.

[Fernanda]

On the one hand, as Nochimson and others have pointed out, Henry prefigured later Lynch heroes by exposing secrets and destroying his limitations. And yet he does so by exercising power and violence over a creature more helpless than he is.

It gets more complicated when the baby mocks Henry after he sees him with the neighbour. In a way the baby is Henry's limitations or an external manifastation of the containment of his energies. The baby's head substitutes Henry's head at some point. It's interesting to think about the way this relates to Bob and Leland.

Also, Agent Stanley's pool of milky water is similar to the one where Henry and the neighbour woman dive into.

I dig your blog, by the way. Keep it up. Great stuff.

Thanks for the work you put into it. I also like the image tributes. Looking forward to the interviews.

[LostInTheMovies]

On the one hand, as Nochimson and others have pointed out, Henry prefigured later Lynch heroes by exposing secrets and destroying his limitations. And yet he does so by exercising power and violence over a creature more helpless than he is.

It gets more complicated when the baby mocks Henry after he sees him with the neighbour. In a way the baby is Henry's limitations or an external manifastation of the containment of his energies. The baby's head substitutes Henry's head at some point. It's interesting to think about the way this relates to Bob and Leland.

Also, Agent Stanley's pool of milky water is similar to the one where Henry and the neighbour woman dive into.

I dig your blog, by the way. Keep it up. Great stuff.

Thanks for the work you put into it. I also like the image tributes. Looking forward to the interviews.

Thanks, Fernanda. I think the Eraserhead baby is a fascinating example of the abstract and the concrete creating subtle friction. Almost everything in the movie encourages us to see the infant as a burden and a monster, an alien "other" that must be destroyed. That the film exists in an otherworldly setting further encourages us to see the creature as a symbol rather than an independent character. And yet...always intrigued by ambiguity and complexity, Lynch allows a few elements to "humanize" the baby, however alien it remains. So that even if the film functions as a spiritual allegory in which Henry's destruction of the baby is necessary and even "correct" something about it remains discomforting and offputting. And I think that's one reason Lynch doesn't want to reveal how "Spike" was really created: part of the films power lies in the uncomfortable sense that the climax does not simply represent a symbolic self-destruction-cum-liberation but also an actual infanticide.

[Fernanda]

In a way the baby is Henry's limitations or an external manifastation of the containment of his energies. The baby's head substitutes Henry's head at some point.

Either before or after the phallic object pops out of his neck and the head falls to the ground.

Part of the films power lies in the uncomfortable sense that the climax does not simply represent a symbolic self-destruction-cum-liberation but also an actual infanticide.

Which is what happens between Laura and Leland.

[LostInTheMovies]

Which is what happens between Laura and Leland.

Exactly - the relationship between the two films fascinates me (I even made a video about the subject!). I definitely see Fire Walk With Me as the biggest fulcrum in Lynch's career, the film in which theme and narrative approach shift fundamentally (I think his style shifts a bit earlier, with Wild at Heart). That said, Twin Peaks may be even more key as a transitional work. The difference between the pilot and finale is really startling on many fronts.

[StealThisCorn]

OH this thread gives me the chance to ask about something else I've always wondered about. At the end of the film, in the train car, Leland whimpers to Laura, "I always thought you knew it was me." But then BOB manifests and hisses, "I never knew you knew it was me..."

I don't understand this. Laura wrote extensively about BOB abusing her in her secret diary, saw him come into her window at night and rape her, saw him in her dreams, sometimes even wrote under his influence etc. The way the Grandson says, "The man behind the mask", makes it seem as if BOB is the man and Leland is the mask, even though, in some ways, BOB is probably also a mask for Leland to Laura over his unhealthy desire for her.

But with that line, it's like the opposite of what I would have expected. Shouldn't BOB know Laura saw him and not her father until she was ready to unlock the truth and face it. He even spoke to her under the fan. This is also problematic because it implies Leland was very culpable in her molestation and even thought she knew? Was he under the delusion she was ok with it till that dark morning when she stood him down then?

[LostInTheMovies]

OH this thread gives me the chance to ask about something else I've always wondered about. At the end of the film, in the train car, Leland whimpers to Laura, "I always thought you knew it was me." But then BOB manifests and hisses, "I never knew you knew it was me..."

I don't understand this. Laura wrote extensively about BOB abusing her in her secret diary, saw him come into her window at night and rape her, seeing him in her dreams etc. The way the Grandson says, "The man behind the mask", makes it seem as if BOB is the man and Leland is the mask, even though, in some ways, BOB is probably also a mask for Leland to Laura over his unhealthy desire for her.

But with that line, it's like the opposite of what I would have expected. Shouldn't BOB know Laura saw him and not her father until she was ready to unlock the truth and face it. He even spoke to her under the fan. This is also problematic because it implies Leland was very culpable in her molestation and even thought she knew? Was he under the delusion she was ok with it till that dark morning when she stood him down then?

My impression is that it was always a "we don't talk about this" kind of thing. Unfortunately, abusive fathers have often been shown to operate under the delusion that their daughters "like" what's going on, and that's it's some kind of consensual secret rather than a matter of shame, manipulation, and intimidation. The car scene demonstrates this for me - when Leland admits to being home the other day (only after Laura presses him on it) his "Where were you? I didn't see you?" retort, especially as delivered, feels very much like a tacit "Come on, now, you know the game we play - don't break the rules." I think Leland really is realizing for the first time that his snarling retort to Sarah, "How do you know what she likes?" actually applies to him more than anyone.

I will say, whatever the nature of Bob's control/possession of Leland I believe the incest is very much Leland's doing. Bob wants to be Laura, but it's Leland who wants to have her. And as with all the physical/metaphysical relationships in Twin Peaks, the two aspects go hand in glove. I think Bob rides on the waves of human emotion and uses them to his advantage and Leland's paranoia, jealousy, and denial provide the perfect stomping ground for him. He is more of a parasite than a puppeteer (though he may ultimately be even more of a partner). Hence his surprise that Laura actually saw him enjoying Leland's - and her - pain and suffering, that she recognized a powerful force of evil, one which could enter her as well, operated through Leland? Not sure; as you point out it's frequently implied that Laura & Bob interact directly (the fan scene does place after the diary pages are torn out fwiw, but then again it doesn't seem to be their first encounter). Which would seem to imply he DID know she knew about him. Maybe what Bob means is that he didn't know she knew he was in her father (maybe he thought she perceived her abuse by Leland and her harassment by Bob as two separate matters). Not sure that last interpretation really works for me but it's one idea.

[LostInTheMovies]

By the way if you haven't yet, check out the Babelwright link Fernanda posted above. It's one of the best readings I've seen of the Lodge people as both real presences and psychological manifestation.

EDIT: Never mind, that was another thread. I'll post it again here:

http://babelwright.wordpress.com/2012/0 ... k-with-me/