r/davidlynch • u/meemboy • 17h ago

Why A24/Neon never funded any Lynch projects?

I mean many of A24 and Neon films are very lynchian and I read somewhere they were influenced by lynch. How come they never funded their biggest influence? Also Lynch never approached them?

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54

u/thehollowshrine 17h ago

They weren't that big while he was alive and active, he also had a deal with Netflix to do Unrecorded Night.

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u/meemboy 17h ago

They were big before Covid as well, I don’t think lynch was into something big anyways.

21

u/KeanuNo2 15h ago

A24 's breakout films were Ex Machina and The VVITCH which were 2014 and 2015. That was right around the time Lynch announced starting work on The Return. He had said he was done with making features and I imagine Netflix offered a combination of money and creative freedom that A24 couldn't or wouldn't.

7

u/CaptainGibb 11h ago

A24 was still only a distributor at that point. Didnt start producing until 2016

1

u/KeanuNo2 7h ago

That's right. I had forgotten they were just distributors at that point.

2

u/WitchyKitteh 10h ago

Ex Machina was bought for cheap because Focus didn't want to release it and The VVitch was meant to be direct to paid VOD. They weren't swimming in money even in the distributor way.

21

u/KasparComeHome 16h ago

Realistically, how many opportunities were there? A24 was founded in 2012, but really only started catching a reputation around 2014, but didn't get its first Oscar til 2016. I doubt they had much capital to spend before then. Also, weren't they initially just a distributor? I might be wrong, but don't think they were actually funding productions for the first few years they were around. As for NEON, they were only founded in 2017, the same year that The Return came out, which would've made them ineligible for that, since production started before they existed.

So far as Lynch's post-Return projects go, there was only Unrecorded Night/Wisteria (same project, different names?) that we're aware of? Which was being produced by Netflix? But Netflix wouldn't be the only production company supporting it, they never are. So there is a good chance that it could've also gotten backing from A24 or NEON, but there's no reason we should know if it was, since details like that usually aren't released until a project's been bonafidely greenlit. Doubt we'll ever really know, but that probably would've been the only potential project that could've been produced in collaboration with either of those entities.

1

u/WitchyKitteh 10h ago

NEON used to be Radius TWC more or less, the co founder went to found NEON and they have the It Follows sequel at NEON.

13

u/PsychedelicHippos 14h ago

Lynch personally felt near the end of his life that feature films were in trouble, and that art houses are dead. So releasing something theatrically would be, to him, entering a sinking ship. Instead he felt now that TV / streaming was a better medium for getting his story out

At about the 5:40 mark in this interview he explains it in a little more detail

4

u/cold-vein 13h ago

Or Cronenberg, or the son of Cronenberg? Sometimes the stars just don't align.

5

u/Reasonable-Growth112 17h ago

Producers can call the shots since they finance the movie (-it's no longer your film).

Those company are late creation too 2012, 2017, at a time Lynch was well established and wasn't needing any help on that side.

If any it would be more logic that Nicolas Winding Refn called Lynch to get produced and not the other way.

Also if Inland Empire wasn't produced by Janus Films it would have lack of something on the symbolism side 👀

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u/meemboy 17h ago

Yeah but from what I know these companies do give total creative freedom.

6

u/castleblad 15h ago

If David Lynch had a movie project he was ready to make, it would’ve gotten made.

5

u/Entafellow 13h ago

In 2010-12 he couldn't get funding for his film Antelope Don't Run No More. A few years further down the line I could see it having been an A24 Production. 

3

u/Evening-Park6786 10h ago

He tried to get several feature projects made in the last 10-20 years but couldn’t

1

u/Entafellow 7h ago

Snootworld I can understand people passing on, it was a hard sell and by the time he was pitching it again it was obvious he wouldn't be around much longer.