Host your own David Lynch Film Festival

Every David Lynch moving picture, including movies, tv shows, short films, music videos, and fake commercials in chronological order

Mar 14, 2025

∙ Paid

Hours before the world learned of David Lynch’s death, earlier that morning, with a cup of coffee in my hand, I greeted my friend Kim Kearny, an INFP painter who shares a birthday with David Lynch (also believed to be an INFP, also a painter). She’d come over to bring me a painting she’d made that reminded her of me, that I was also instantly attracted to. As we chatted about the painting, I invited her to see my new movie room, and told her, “I call it The Black Lodge.” She laughed and instantly got the David Lynch Twin Peaks reference.

Kim and I outside with the painting, just before we learned of David Lynch’s death.

We sat on my sofa, which has a Twin Peaks throw pillow and a Twin Peaks throw blanket, in this room I call The Black Lodge, and talked about the painting, art, and the home movie theater I’d installed in the room recently, with a projector and screen mounted to the ceiling.

My pillow and my phone with David Lynch’s audiobook, *Catching the Big Fish*, taken back when I read the audiobook first in 2019.

Little did I know, I’d soon be rewatching every David Lynch film in order and seeing his shorts for the first time, on this new movie setup, in a self-guided private memorial to one of my all-time favorite filmmakers, authors, musicians, painters, and humans.

What were you doing when you learned of David Lynch’s death? Were you a fan?

After Lynch’s birthday twin, Kim, had left, I opened my phone and gasped. David Lynch was dead. Tears came to my eyes, and I felt a crushing sense of cultural loss. I immediately texted Kim, who hadn’t heard the news yet and was equally devasted, but we also both sensed that somehow we, and probably countless others, his big fans, had been telepathically notified of his passing, because why else would we have been together talking about The Black Lodge that morning? This isn’t a phrase I usually say aloud and Kim rarely comes to my house in the middle of the morning, much less bearing an abstract painting she’d made before she ever met me, but which seemed for me (the painting’s colors matched my living room colors and in pencil on it, she’d scrawled Capricorn, and I’m a Capricorn.) It all felt so Lynchian.

So, in tribute to Lynch, whose films and show Twin Peaks are so beloved to me, and whose Catching the Big Fish book is one of my favorite books on creativity, I compiled this chronological list of his works, complete with links for where to watch them, and I want to share it with you too, in case you want to host your own David Lynch Film Festival at home.

I’m going slowly in my festival watching, savoring each film. Next up for me is Wild at Heart. I also forgot how much I love his first feature-length film, Eraserhead. It’s a masterpiece. I’d never seen his early shorts, but really loved Absurd Encounter with Fear and The Amputee.

Watching his films in order, I can already see shades of what’s to come with Twin Peaks. In the early short films, he’s working through his favorite themes, repeating imagery, and experimenting with the power of sound.

This retrospective was a lot of work to put together, so I’ve made two versions: one with just his feature films and TV shows for my free subscribers, and the complete filmography including shorts, music videos, and commercials as well as his feature films in chronological order for my paid subscribers.

There are too many shorts to count, and as I compiled these, what struck me the most was how David Lynch never stopped experimenting.

I hope he’s in heaven still making strange films.

Enjoy.

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