Critiquing an Emotional Unknown: Filmic Excess in Lynch's Twin Peaks

Abstract

My work combines characteristics of excess theory and affect theory in order to develop a methodology for critiquing excess. By applying my theory to David Lynch's Twin Peaks: The Return, I offer a perspective on how to successfully criticize works that contain excess. Birthed from Roland Barthes' essay, "The Third Meaning," excess theory contends that some films may hold a sense that exceeds semiotics, that has a "signifier [which] possesses a theoretical individuality," and that supposedly exists separately from interpretation or classification. Affect theory analyzes the emotions that a spectator experiences while watching a film. Discourse around this branch of study focus on genres that directly stimulate the body; horror, for example, brings repulsion and comedy causes laughter. Because both disciplines discuss subjective experiences that involve the emotion of the spectator, the discourse around the two fields of study can be linked. Using affect theorist Eugenie Brinkema's theory of critiquing affect as upholding the ideology of a work can help to further the relatively stagnant discussion around excess. As a result of authors like Roland Barthes and Kristen Thompson offering blanket praise for films that contain excess, the quality has become labelled as being inherently good. By treating excess as yet another editing or cinematography technique that manipulates an audience into interpreting in a certain way, this essay analyzes the use of excess in Twin Peaks: The Return. By tracing excess in Lynch's recent series, I demonstrate how Lynch manipulates the viewer into experiencing and relating to his outlook on social progression and religion.