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The remainder of the film explores the abject horror he feels at the prospect of being forever tethered to a responsibility he doesn’t feel equipped to handle. The "baby" is a deformed, fleshy little thing wrapped in gauze bandages and constantly mewling with the most uncanny, spine tingling little voice. The sound effect used for the baby’s vocalizations alone is enough to give you nightmares, but things quickly go from bad to worse. Once Mary and the tot move in with Henry, the pressure is too much for them. She eventually abandons them, leaving her terrified spouse alone to deal with their unholy offspring and his own increasingly horrifying thoughts.

If the first half of Eraserhead was merely unsettling, the second half is about the closest thing to a waking nightmare that you’ll ever experience. Henry is completely appalled at the idea of parenthood, and as difficult as it is for him to form relationships with adults, it’s even that much harder with an infant. The hopelessness and disorder that engulf his mind manifest themselves in bizarre hallucinations and dreams that are as difficult for viewers to watch as they are for Henry to endure. Here is where the surrealist ambitions of Eraserhead work to perfection and the results will either leave you inspired and amazed, or they’ll make you want to take the movie out of the DVD player, smash it, burn it, bury the ashes and call in a priest to banish it to hell.

Any new parent experiences fear and uncertainty as they embark on one of life’s greatest challenges. But for many this fear generates the sort of emotional suffering that usually only afflicts people in Greek mythology and Eraserhead successfully compresses that feeling into an 85 minute battering ram of dread.

This bears repeating: Eraserhead contains the black hideous torment of a thousand nightmares in every frame, and there are few movies you’ll ever see that do a better job of making that so tangible. The film’s imagery quietly pounds at your psyche from the word go. Gnarled trees, twisted pipes, clumps of dirt and shafts of light piercing seas of barren blackness are only occasionally interrupted by gooey giant wiggly things, dancing maggots, and babies so hideous their own mothers don’t love them. The soundtrack is a mash-up of industrial noises, home made effects and eerily disturbing music pushed through a reverb and cut with filters until all that remains is a ghost.

Exposure to David Lynch usually leaves you feeling like you’ve been somewhere else, and I think that may be why so many very odd people love his work. There’s an artistry to his films that make you feel engaged when you don’t want to be, and make you watch even though you’d prefer to look away. It’s not something I enjoy experiencing, but if the purpose of a movie is to take you someplace that you’ve never been before, it’s hard to argue that Lynch isn’t a gifted man.

Eraserhead is the sort of film I’d only recommend to people who consider themselves students of cinema, or anyone who enjoys being challenged by their entertainment. The purpose of this movie is not to charm you, and it isn’t even interested in scaring you. Eraserhead is the process of one man exorcising some very powerful demons, tearing a page from a diary written in ink from his own soul and splashed onto the screen in a way that forces you to share his terror. It’s amazing, provocative, disgusting, confusing, and everything in between. Whether you like it or not, it is indisputably a true work of art but whether you consider that a gift or a form of torture is up to you. Personally, I consider it both. It’s not exactly cats on a piano, but it’s not something I want to go through on a regular basis, either. On the other hand, the music of Arnold Schoenberg I definitely consider a form of torture. Call me unsophisticated if you want.

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