The Amputee
A double leg amputated woman sits and writes a long meandering letter while her ineffective nurse attempts to attend to her stumps.A double leg amputated woman sits and writes a long meandering letter while her ineffective nurse attempts to attend to her stumps.A double leg amputated woman sits and writes a long meandering letter while her ineffective nurse attempts to attend to her stumps.
Catherine E. Coulson
(as Catherine Coulson)
Six Men Getting Sick
The Alphabet
The Grandmother
Premonition Following an Evil Deed
Absurd Encounter with Fear
Darkened Room
Fictitious Anacin Commercial
DumbLand
Out Yonder
Sailing with Bushnell Keeler
The French as Seen by...
This short came about because the American Film Institute was testing two different kinds of black and white video, and they hired cinematographer Frederick Elmes to shoot the test footage. David Lynch convinced Elmes to shoot a short film for the test and stayed up all night writing the script. As a result, the short exists in two different versions, being shot once on each of the types of video being tested.
Woman with amputation to the legs: This isn't what I am telling you. You weren't in the room when Jim said that. And I was. And he really did. He told me that everything was fine between Helen and him. And I knew that even if he didn't say it, that it was true. He knew it then. No one else did. You maybe thought you did but I knew you didn't. And it makes me furious when you tell me I didn't know about Helen. She was my best friend. She even told me about that time she drank gin with you. So maybe now you'll believe me. After that I got sick of the beach. Harry turned on all of the burners on the stove before we left the cabin. He said he wanted to set fire to the whole row. Made me sick. Everything was bad between us. And that was it for me. I never said one word to him on the way back. When he stopped and we saw Joann at Jim's, he bought some cigarettes and told Joann that I was a flirt, a dumb flirt. I never was a flirt. I was not flirting with Jim. I didn't flirt then and I don't flirt now. And you started this that night Jim told me. You have never understood Jim. After the way you treated Helen it isn't a wonder that he feels the way he does. And you know it. And you know that even Paul isn't the same. You have never understood Jim. You had it all wrong, honey. You and Joann. Now you know what Paul is really talking about. By the way, where were you when Paul got home at three in the morning?
Edited into The Short Films of David Lynch (2002)
A little throwaway short from David Lynch
David Lynch made this short during a troubled time when filming of Eraserhead had come to a stand-still due to lack of funds. He volunteered to make a short film twice as a test for a couple of stocks of black and white videotape that the American Film Institute wished to compare. As a result he made a film called The Amputee twice. Both versions are more or less the same and consist of a woman who is a double-amputee reading aloud to herself the contents of a letter that she has written while a doctor tends one of the stumps on her legs. It ends with the stump gushing blood, the doctor fleeing and the woman completely oblivious.
In truth it isn't very interesting. It's shot in one take with ugly composition. The quality of the videotape is poor in both versions; while the content is a combination of the repulsive with the mundane. It was written and filmed over the course of one day, and it is throwaway stuff that is of limited interest. It's more an example of the director's bizarre humour than anything else. It stars Catherine Coulson who would go on to play the part of The Log Lady in Twin Peaks.
Red-Barracuda
Безногая
1.37 : 1
By what name was The Amputee (1974) officially released in Canada in English?