David Lynch
American filmmaker (1946-2025) · United States · Directors · Died at 78
David Lynch is read about 9,863 times a day, in 87 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 15 October 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 390 days, one point a day.
Something wrong?The filmmaker who made surrealism feel inevitable on screen - the dream logic of Twin Peaks, the dread beneath Blue Velvet's white picket fences, the slow-burn unease of Eraserhead. Lynch didn't explain his work and didn't need to.
A life in dates
Beatles '64Film2020Academy Honorary AwardAwardSitges Grand Honorary AwardAward2019
Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic SoundFilm2017
The NinetiesSeries2015
Rammstein in AmerikaFilm2012
Side by SideFilm2009
Interview ProjectSeries, Creator2008
SurveillanceFilm, Producer2007Officer of the Legion of HonourAward2006Golden LionAwardGolden Lion for Lifetime AchievementAward
Inland EmpireFilm, 2006Director, Writer2005
Robot ChickenSeries, Mad Scientist (voice)2003
Un film et son époqueSeries2002Knight of the Legion of HonourAward2001Cannes Best Director AwardAward
Mulholland DriveFilm, 2001Director, Writer1999“A film is its own thing and in an ideal world I think a film should be discovered knowing nothing and nothing should be added to it and nothing should be subtracted from it.”In their wordsScene by Scene interview BBC 2 (1999)European Film Award for Best Non-European FilmAward
Family GuySeries, 1999Gus (voice)1997“In film, life-and-death struggles make you sit up, lean forward a little bit. They amplify things happening, in smaller ways, in all of us. These things show up in relationships.”In their words6 March 1997As quoted in "Lost Highway" interview by Mikal Gilmore in Rolling Stone (6 March 1997)“The beginning dictates the direction and you never know where you're going to go ... the mood is what you're looking for, and somehow we always find it.”In their wordsAs quoted in Pretty as a Picture : The Art of David Lynch (1997)“Every single thing in the world that was made by anyone started with an idea.”In their wordsInterview with Chris Douridas (1997) quoted in David Lynch Interviews (2009) by Richard A. Barney
Scene by SceneSeries, 19971995
Lumière & CompanyFilm, Director1993Saturn AwardsAward1992
On the AirSeries, Director, Writer
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with MeFilm, 1992Director, Writer1990“I don't think about technique. The ideas dictate everything. You have to be true to that or you're dead.”In their words14 January 1990As quoted in "Dark Lens on America" in The New York Times Magazine (14 January 1990)Palme d'OrAward1989
Cinéma, de notre tempsSeries, David Lynch
Twin PeaksFilm, 1989Director, Writer1986
Blue VelvetFilm, Director, Writer1984“All the movies are about strange worlds that you can't go into unless you build them and film them. That's what's so important about film to me.”In their wordsAs quoted in The Making of Dune (1984) by Ed Naha, p. 2131982César AwardAwardCésar Award for Best Foreign FilmAward1977
EraserheadFilm, Director, Writer1970
The GrandmotherFilm, Director, Writer1967
Absurd Encounter with FearFilm, Director1953
The OscarsSeries1946Born20 January 1946Also in Deutsch
Photos 12
Lynch's high school senior portrait, 1964
Theatrical release poster for Eraserhead (1977)
Isabella Rossellini and Kyle MacLachlan in a publicity still for Blue Velvet (1986).
Lynch at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival
Lynch purchased several properties in the Hollywood Hills, subsequently forming the David Lynch Compound, in the early 1990s. The site became his primary residence; it housed an editing bay, recording studio, and was the filming location for several of his films.
Lynch (second from left) at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival promoting Mulholland DriveIn their own words 10
, A film is its own thing and in an ideal world I think a film should be discovered knowing nothing and nothing should be added to it and nothing should be subtracted from it.
When you're an artist, you pick up on certain things that are in the air. You just feel it.
In film, life-and-death struggles make you sit up, lean forward a little bit. They amplify things happening, in smaller ways, in all of us. These things show up in relationships.
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101K subscribersFilmography 40
BEBeatles '64
TFThe Fabelmans
TMThe Other MeMSMaking Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound
LULucky
WDWHAT DID JACK DO?
DLDavid Lynch: The Art Life
GDGirlfriend's DayRARammstein in Amerika
TPTwin Peaks: The Missing Pieces
MBMy Beautiful Broken Brain
HFHarry Dean Stanton: Partly FictionSSSide by Side
MDMy Son, My Son, What Have Ye DoneSUSurveillance
TCTo Each His Own CinemaIEInland Empire
MMMidnight Movies: From the Margin to the Mainstream
RARabbits
DRDarkened RoomMDMulholland Drive
TSThe Straight Story
LHLost HighwayLCLumière & Company
NANadja
MFMichael Jackson: Dangerous - The Short FilmsTMTwin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me
WHWild at Heart
IBIndustrial Symphony No. 1: The Dream of the BrokenheartedTPTwin Peaks
TFThe Cowboy and the FrenchmanBVBlue Velvet
DUDune
TMThe Elephant ManEREraserhead
TAThe AmputeeTGThe Grandmother
TAThe Alphabet
SSSix Men Getting SickAFAbsurd Encounter with Fear412 credits on file
Television 24
MMMel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!
TPThis Is PopTNThe Nineties
LOLouie
TSThe Cleveland ShowIPInterview Project
LELegendsRCRobot Chicken
LCLeçon de CinémaUÉUn film et son époque
RARabbits
DUDumbLandFGFamily GuySSScene by Scene
HRHotel Room
TLThe Tonight Show with Jay LenoOAOn the Air
TPTwin PeaksCTCinéma, de notre tempsTOThe Oscars
MDMulholland Dr.Awards
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David Keith Lynch started as a painter in the 1960s and began making short films to put movement into his canvases. Eraserhead, his first feature, took five years to finish on a shoestring and became a midnight-movie fixture. The Elephant Man in 1980 brought him into the mainstream, followed by the poison-suburbia of Blue Velvet in 1986 and a Palme d'Or for Wild at Heart in 1990. He co-created Twin Peaks with Mark Frost the same year - a surrealist horror-mystery that rewrote what television could be and earned him nine Emmy nominations across its two runs. Mulholland Drive arrived in 2001 as a fever dream of Hollywood; Inland Empire in 2006 was his last feature. A Transcendental Meditation devotee for decades, he founded a charity to teach the practice to at-risk communities. He died at his daughter's home in January 2025, days after wildfire evacuations worsened the emphysema he'd carried from a lifetime of smoking.
In common with David
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