The Alphabet
The Alphabet
| 13 February 1969 (USA)
The Alphabet Trailers

A woman's dark and absurdist nightmare vision comprising a continuous recitation of the alphabet and bizarre living representations of each letter.

Reviews
Dorathen Better Late Then Never
Dirtylogy It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.
Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.
Sabah Hensley This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama
jordan mackenzie I'm a Lynch fan. Perhaps more an admirer of his art than his films. And I love most of his films. What I like most about his short films, particularly his early ones, is that the themes or ideas presented - although abstract - are singular. I adore MD for what it is to me... A collection of brilliant short stories which parallels never really added up. I've read some clever thesis on the subject and some even struck a chord. But for me, Lynch hits hardest when he's not tied to a specific plot or timescale. Alphabet and rabbits are a prime example. I never bothered reading theories on their meanings because they made sense to me right away.The one thing I'll say about Lynch is that he does not give any credit to his influences.
Tommy Nelson Many films, or books, or any form of media will challenge the mind and make you think in order to draw your own conclusions. What this short film feels like, is something that wasn't written with too much depth. The direction was what the time was spent on making this, not any kind of deep writing, and because of that, this short film suffers from a lack of any kind of coherent anything.A girl lays in bed and begins having nightmares about the alphabet. The beginning is live action, and the middle moves into animated territory where the letters are given birth to and nightmarishly appearing. The film ends with a weird upside down face, and the girl from the opening reciting the alphabet, only to then throw up blood. It's quite original, but at the same time, quite impossible to comprehend.The acting...well, there's one actress and she is fine. The direction is very atmospheric and creepy. The background is almost always black, and the constant chanting of the ABC's is both strange and eerie. The writing is what I question. Director David Lynch must have had something in mind for what this meant...no I don't think so. It really doesn't seem to mean anything. It's just a creepy short about an alphabetic nightmare that can really only be taken at face value. The deeper you dive into what this means, the less sense it makes. Let's just call it an experiment with animation and direction and leave it at that.This short is effectively scary, but missing the substance necessary to make a short that has some sort of meaning. Yet these disturbing images are still tattooed on my brain(?)...My rating: ** 1/2 out of ****. 4 mins.
Michael_Elliott Alphabet, The (1968) *** (out of 4) David Lynch's second film is a four-minute short of a nightmare with a woman in bed saying the alphabet. This is an extremely weird short but at the same time it's perfectly surreal and just downright strange. The bizarre images of the woman spitting up blood are eerie to say the least. This certainly isn't a film to show you kids to each them to say their ABC's.Six Men Getting Sick (1966) ** 1/2 (out of 4) David Lynch's first film is an animated short running four minutes that shows exactly what the title says. The animation is ugly, the soundtrack annoying but these two things are what makes the film work. The film is rather surreal in a weird sort of way but this fits the director just fine.
dbborroughs Based on an actual event, Lynch's niece had a nightmare where she recited the alphabet in her sleep, this film is basically the same thing, with a young woman reciting the alphabet in her sleep while we see nightmarish imagery.Its an interesting piece with truly frightening images. Unfortunately the animation isn't all that spectacular, consisting of animated drawings. Its a good piece that mostly works and shows the seeds of the later Eraserhead.If you come across one of the short film videos of Lynch's early work this film, and one or two others, makes it worth renting.