I was considering David Lynch’s type based on his movies. He’s definitely some kind of NT, and his films don’t seem busy enough to be that of an ENTP (what I’m now calling the “kitchen sink effect”), so I was pretty much down to INTP or INTJ. (Really, The Straight Story is so slow that it’s almost inconceivable to consider it the work of an Extravert of any kind.)

Then it occurred to me: his means of completing Mulholland Dr. was the ultimate Ni perspective shift. Basically, he took a 90-minute TV pilot and reinterpreted it as a dream sequence within a larger film. (This is the “spin” of Ni I was referring to earlier.) It’s no wonder he was so well-suited to translating Frank Herbert’s INTJ epic, Dune, to the silver screen.

Whereas Ne catches ideas and associations from the unconscious as they float to the surface of the conscious mind, Ni goes deeper, plunging right into that dark well of dreams and symbols. Have a look at the video below to see what I’m talking about:

Note how Lynch contrasts Ni with Ne — this is very instructive for anyone wishing to grasp an Ni take on the differences between the two functions.

I love Frank Herbert’s original Dune novel — it’s one of my favourite books, and I have a real soft-spot for David Lynch’s bizarro adaptation as well.

But I’m still waiting for a Dune film that works as a piece of cinema in its own right. Lynch’s Dune captured the atmosphere of the novel but its narrative was a confusing mess; the TV miniseries was a dull and uninspired retelling of the events of the novel without any kind of vision. Is it too much to expect an adaptation to be both bold and coherent? (For the record, I found Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings films fairly sterile and dry as well.)

Now there’s a new Dune film on the horizon. Could this be the Holy Grail? Probably not, but I hope I’m wrong.