Twin Peaks: The Missing Pieces (2014)

I think my favorite thing about Twin Peaks: The Missing Pieces is how it argues for the precision of Fire Walk With Me. Some of the scenes here are perfect, among the best I’ve seen from Twin Peaks/Lynch in general, but most of them would only serve to pull focus from Laura Palmer’s story, softening the blow so to speak. 

I don’t think that any of the scenes should be added to FWWM, but I do think they’re essential — the scene where Leland teaches Laura and Sara how to introduce themselves in Norwegian just crushes me. To make that for a movie detailing how this man eventually kills his daughter, which makes the pain of his abuse razor sharp, some years after the famous reveal, takes a lot of guts — like, it changed how I understand the show.

It also takes a lot of guts to cut something like that. Whereas a scene like Pete explaining 2x4s or the Desmond/Cable fight or the extra David Bowie bits (or the stuff that takes place after the season two finale!) feel extraneous in the context of the final cut of FWWM, cutting anything with Laura or Leland had to feel like torture. It was also the right call — this isn’t a movie about Leland Palmer. It’s about Laura. A cute, sweet scene about Leland does not serve her story, but his, and there’s already a whole-ass television show about it. Absolutely worth watching as a consideration of the old maxim that editing is where a film finds its soul or whatever.