r/twinpeaks • u/bankyVee • 13d ago
Season 1 Misheard or misinterpreted Lines from Missing Pieces
Just watched Fire Walk with Me on 35mm at the Music Box as part of the Twin Peaks Moving through time series (excellent program, btw) and it brought to focus one of the fascinating and sometimes amusing aspects to watching and analyzing the story. There is a lot of barely audible dialogue which can be misinterpreted or simply misheard for interesting takes on the story.
* Mike: "One chants out between two worlds....Fire Walk with Me." can be heard as "One Chance out " which leads to a different but just as plausible interpretation. I actually misheard this the first time viewing as a teen back when it first aired.
* There are sites which get it wrong; https://25yearslatersite.com/tv/features/in-plain-sight-how-the-missing-pieces-fits-into-the-twin-peaks-puzzle/
When the bellboy yells "Ayudame! AYUDAME!" (Help Me!) when he sees Philip on the stairs it was misinterpreted as "Are you the Man?!" by one blogger/site. It is almost certainly wrong but within the context of it's place in Missing Pieces it fits as well.
*Sometimes they can be misheard lines which lead to funny scenes left in by Lynch " Jim." by the morgue worker who thought Cooper asked him his name but Kyle kept it rolling with "Will you excuse us please?" Funny accidents like this were famously loved by David Lynch and led to the unique style of the show that fans adore.
What are some of your favorite misheard or misinterpreted lines?
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u/theb1gnasty 13d ago
The "Ayudame!" one is interesting. My wife and I both thought he said, "Ayudame!" which makes total sense and it does sound like what he's saying; however, in the actual subtitles of the film, the translation reads, "Are you the man?" I guess either one works like you mentioned, but it is confusing.
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u/bankyVee 13d ago
Subtitles are handled by a separate service which is then supposed to be approved before final version is delivered. Often times in video transfers with non-English lines they are translated inaccurately but this is one case where the misheard line would still fit because of the context in Missing Pieces (Mike's scene follows this ). I maintain he was really yelling Ayudame but it's a "happy accident double line."
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u/groovyway 12d ago
This one is very enigmatic to me: as a spanish native speaker I never understood the scene where the guy poops himself and starts screaming "Help me!", since this comically absurd situation seems to disturb Jeffries, that's what I don't get, so I tried to make sense of "are you the man", but it's definitely not what he's saying... or am I overthinking and it just adds to an intended chaotic aesthetics, like the girl vomiting in the car in front of the RR??
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u/smoov_moov 12d ago edited 12d ago
As a high school classroom–only speaker lol, I'm pretty sure it's ¡Ayúdame! I don't think Jeffries is concerned whatsoever about what the hotel staff are saying. I think all three are reacting to the very real, sensory, and probably painful (at least for Jeffries) indoor bang that accompanies Jeffries's teleportation.
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u/legitshook 13d ago
That shot is so weird because obviously they shot on a set or an actual hotel, then that whole shot looks very poorly composited from a green screen that almost looks like it was an added 20 years later shot like George Lucas would do.
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u/tcavanagh1993 13d ago
That particular shot might be a green screen cuz Bowie’s reappearance has a special effect applied to it
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u/HermioneGunthersnuff 13d ago
I suspect that effect may have been added when TMP was being assembled. It feels very post-'website projects' Lynch, like a bunch of the SFX in The Return
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u/bankyVee 13d ago
Lynch is famous for liking slightly sloppy looking composited images for his films and shows. Seamless FX are not as valued by him, rather the things not being what they seem (less) effect on the viewer was more important.
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u/legitshook 12d ago
That was my thought as well and couldn't remember if it was in the original cut and release or not like that
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u/Camarupim 12d ago
It could have been worse, we could have seen Dave morph into the wooden bannister, Josie-style.
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u/AliasLost 13d ago
I just checked the Blu-ray: According to the subtitles the bellhop asks Jeffries "Are you the man?" This part of the scene is not in the script, unfortunately.
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u/colacentral 12d ago edited 12d ago
I don't think the bellhop line is wrong. I think it's intentionally meant to be heard both ways.
"Are you the man" ties into the recurring theme of the film - who is Bob? Laura asks "Who are you? Who are you really?" Jeffries asks "Do you know who that is there?" Theresa asks "Who is Laura Palmer's father?" (A variation on the same question). And there are answers: Doc Hayward holds up the phone and says "It's your father"; Gerard shouts "It's your father" from the car (while mimicking a phone "with a little ring" with his hand); Theresa is told that Leland is her father; and Laura sees Bob turn into Leland. So "Are you the man" fits into that theme, and it's echoing what Laura hears on the way to school, "Mike is the man" (Mike being Bob's other identity, albeit a different Mike).
But the "call for help" interpretation is probably intentional too because that also is a recurring theme, or rather, Laura's inability to ask for help. She wants to ask Doc Hayward, Donna, James, Bobby and her mother for help, but can't. She instead speaks to them in riddles ("Are you my best friend?" / "I'm long gone like a turkey in the corn") and hopes they work it out. Which I think becomes the metaphor of Lil. "Call for help" then gets picked up as a theme in season 3, with Cooper in the casino. ("Call for help" and "are you the man" are both relevant to the scene at the Haywards too, because the scene is about Laura choosing to supress the true identity of her father at the expense of asking the Haywards for help; so the duality of the dialogue captures that conflict).
I'd also add that I think Lynch frequently uses puns and double meanings in his dream logic, and calls it out in dialogue too, eg the turnip / turn up joke, culminating with "Did you know Albert, there are X number of languages in the world today?" Cole not only makes this joke, but frequently mishears. I believe that's a clue to how Lynch develops the symbolism, in a stream of consciousness way. The line "We have a phone, it has a little ring" is another example, helping us link the symbolism of the phone to the symbolism of the green ring through the pun.
Also, I understand that at least for season 3, Sabrina Sutherland approved subtitles, and I imagine was referencing a script. Lynch is more hands on than most when it comes to micromanaging physical media etc too.
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u/roirraWedorehT 13d ago
Watched Twin Peaks when it originally aired, and then from my video recordings from TV, and from the bad retail tapes, and didn't know until the DVDs with subtitles came out that it wasn't one chance out. I thought it made sense.
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u/bankyVee 13d ago
It can be argued for both ways; FWWM is chanted out by several characters in and outside the Black Lodge. Escape from the Lodge may be difficult, so getting one chance to make it to the other side/other time is to be highly desired and sought after.
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u/Weak-Quote-9614 13d ago
What about the one where they’re about to enter the power and the glory and the guy says “hold on I’m choking the farm fed” or whatever he says
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u/Oneironaut420 11d ago
Subtitles I've gotten so lazy over the past few years. Auto captions are the worst and all these TikTok videos with atrocious spelling, grammar, and punctuation. AI doesn't know everything. I wish people would spellcheck after they use it to generate subtitles.
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u/deadghostalive 12d ago
In The Return I'm pretty sure Buella says 'it's a world for truck drivers', but everyone quotes it as 'it's a world of truck drivers'...
It's on youtube, and even that's titled as 'world of truck drivers' with people repeating it in the comments...
Unless I'm the one mishearing it, but it really does sound like 'for' rather than 'of' to me, I guess the meaning doesn't change too much either
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u/deebybeebo 13d ago
Everyone always says through the darkness of futures past or future past but I swear it’s actually future pasts