Inland Empire:David Lynch to distribute own film.

[KiwiCoromandel]

Director David Lynch has worked out a deal with French producer StudioCanal to self-distribute his three-hour epic digital video feature Inland Empire in the United States and Canada.

A release is slated before the end of the year, as is an awards season campaign for Laura Dern, the star and co-producer of the three-hour film. Inland Empire, which has sharply divided critics, marks Lynch's first feature since 2001's Mulholland Dr.

Lynch will work with theatrical and home video partners to launch his epic fever dream of a film, retaining all rights to the low-budget project in each deal. The partnerships will be announced within the next week.

"Basically we learned a lot from our experiences with The Straight Story and Mulholland Dr." said Inland Empire producer Mary Sweeney.

"There was a lot spent on P&A (prints and advertising). Those experiences, the new technologies of digital distribution available today, along with David's completely avant-garde attitude toward life make this the right film at the right time for this approach."

Inland Empire, which had its premiere at the Venice International Film Festival, begins with two interwoven stories of an actress, played by Dern, who is making an onscreen comeback in a Southern melodrama she's filming called High in Blue Tomorrows. But the film soon branches off to follow a third abused and abusive character also played by Dern.

"I figure I have at least three roles, maybe a few more," Dern laughed in a recent interview.

Each plotline deals with issues of betrayal in relationships, but the film soon veers off those tracks as it showcases musical dance sequences, sitcom-style family scenes featuring people with rabbit heads and dramatic episodes with actors speaking Polish.

In an interview after a press screening last Friday ahead of its North American premiere at the New York Film Festival, Lynch said, "people are thinking of new ways to begin a film, new ways of shooting, new ways of post production, and you've got to come up with new ways of distribution."

He added facetiously that his target audience is "14-year-old girls in the Midwest ... I would like it to be a summer blockbuster, but I'm realistic."

source:Reuters/Hollywood Reporter

image: P Photo/ Marion Curtis, Film Soc:LAURA DERN at the premiere of INLAND EMPIRE during the 44th New York Film Festival on Sunday..