The whole scene clocks in at seven minutes and fourteen seconds. There are long pauses between lines, reaction shots of still faces, pleasantries exchanged, fraught with deeper meaning. Lynch uses these same tools to invoke dread at various points across his oeuvre ; here, those silences are filled with a gentler edge, the past casting its heavy, sad spell on those trying to live in the present.
How does Lynch manage to evoke pathos, rather than horror ? For one, the performances of Forster and Beymer do much of the heavy lifting. They carry the burdens of both Frank and Ben in the subtle ways their faces communicate without words. Beymer moves back in his chair, and then forward, as he contemplates the sins not only of his grandson, but also of himself, and how that could have been passed on. Their connection over the key, and Ben’s touching gesture to offer it as a memento for Frank’s sick brother, Harry, reminds us of the history Harry holds with him. Once again in the series, an absent character conjures up deep feeling in those who care for them.
Lynch plays the scene without any non-diagetic sound. We are conditioned to hear Angelo Badalamenti music, or a sickening drone, or crackling electricity in the air, when we watch a Lynch scene. The dead silence apart from voices focuses our attention.
The coup-de-grâce comes when Richard remembers his father buying and painting a bicycle for him. It’s a simple memory, but Beymer and Lynch imbue the moment with a rich tenderness of loss, knowing that Richard never had a father who could make such a gesture the way Ben’s father did to him. Even Beverly sheds a tear.
If Lynch had compressed this scene by even a couple of minutes, it wouldn’t carry the same power. We need those silences, those still, composed reaction shots of Ben’s steady movements, in order to let this eulogy truly sink in. Ben is mourning the death of his family, in spirit if not in body.