And, indeed, I will ask on my own account here, an idle question: which is better—cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better?---Fyodor Dostoevsky ---Notes from Underground Fyodor Dostoevsky ---Notes from Underground Even now, so many years later, all this is somehow a very evil memory. I have many evil memories now, but ... hadn’t I better end my “Notes” here? I believe I made a mistake in beginning to write them, anyway I have felt ashamed all the time I’ve been writing this story; so it’s hardly literature so much as a corrective punishment. Why, to tell long stories, showing how I have spoiled my life through morally rotting in my corner, through lack of fitting environment, through divorce from real life, and rankling spite in my underground world, would certainly not be interesting; a novel needs a hero, and all the traits for an anti-hero are expressly gathered together here, and what matters most, it all produces an unpleasant impression, for we are...
Hope
To be human is to be a miracle of evolution conscious of its own miraculousness — a consciousness beautiful and bittersweet, for we have paid for it with a parallel awareness not only of our fundamental improbability but of our staggering fragility, of how physiologically precarious our survival is and how psychologically vulnerable our sanity. To make that awareness bearable, we have evolved a singular faculty that might just be the crowning miracle of our consciousness: hope.--
Erich Fromm
"There's only one thing worse than not having a cigar, and that's having a cigar and no light."
A 90-year-old atheist has outlived and out-smoked his contemporaries, and as he comes to terms with his own mortality, he searches for ever-elusive enlightenment.
“Lucky” begins with series of shots of the Arizona desert: broken-backed hills, cacti reaching for the sky. It locates a tortoise crawling on the ground. This is President Roosevelt, whose predicament we’ll learn about in due course. Then it settles on a human equivalent of that tortoise: the title character, Lucky, played by then-89-year old Harry Dean Stanton, who died mere weeks before this film’s commercial release.
Over the course of the next 88 minutes, we spend almost every moment in the company of Lucky. Lucky is a long-retired World War II veteran. He has friends but is often brusque and impatient with them. He has a routine, and like many older people, it gives shape to his days.
He walks around town and stops in the local coffee shop, where he talks to the head cook (Barry Shabaka Henley) and a particular waitress, Loretta (Yvonne Huff), who takes an almost daughterly interest in his well being to the point of stopping by Lucky’s tiny home to inquire about his health and share her stash of weed. Lucky goes to his favorite bar and drinks and talks to the owner Elaine (Beth Grant) and her husband Paulie (James Darren, of TV’s “T.J. Hooker” and several “Gidget” films). They argue amongst themselves and with other patrons about philosophy, morality, religion, game shows, etc. We see a lot of Lucky at home, often in his baggy underwear, doing yoga exercises and smoking cigarettes (he has a pack-a-day habit, has since he was a teenage.
This movie is about death, of course, and fear of death, and health, and loneliness. It’s about the choices not made and the roads not taken: Lucky has a lot of regrets, but you often have to deduce what they are, because he’s the kind of crabby old eccentric who’d rather get into debates with people than just talk to them. (Other people talk more openly than he does, often as a means of trying to get him to open up and be vulnerable, which is really not his style.) Much is made of Lucky’s atheism, which complicates his defiant attitude towards the inevitable approach of death.
“Friendship is essential to the soul,” Paulie tells him at the bar.
“It doesn’t exist,” Lucky replies, an edge in his voice.
“Friendship?” Paulie clarifies.
“The soul!” Lucky yells.
The movie was written by Logan Sparks and Drago Sumonja, and directed by longtime actor turned filmmaker John Carroll Lynch (of “Fargo,” “Zodiac” and other films too numerous to mention—he’s another Stanton in the making). I’ve seen a lot of movies that try to be “Lucky”—movies about eccentric people in a small town or neighborhood who hang out in bars and coffee shops and have conversations—but very few that have this film’s elegant shape, its sense of when to hang back and listen and when to let the camera tell the story, and when to end a thought and move on to the next one.
It’s the humblest deep movie of recent years, a work in the same vein as American marginalia like “Stranger Than Paradise” and “Trees Lounge,” but with its own rhythm and color, its own emotional temperature, its own reasons for revealing and concealing things. There’s a long scene of Lucky smoking cigarettes at night and thinking. The soundtrack plays Johnny Cash’s “I See a Darkness," one of many late-career classics in which the singer faced the certainty of his own death. The sandblasted terrain of Stanton’s face in this scene constitutes a movie within a movie, a life revealed in contemplation. It's one of the most powerful things I’ve ever seen. I felt that way before Stanton left us. I feel it even more keenly now.
Harry Dean Stanton (1926–2017) was an American actor and musician whose career spanned over six decades. Known for his gaunt features and weary, soulful presence, he became one of the most beloved character actors in history. His breakthrough role came in 1984 with Wim Wenders' Paris, Texas, but he is equally legendary for roles in Alien, Repo Man, Cool Hand Luke, and Twin Peaks.
Harry Dean Stanton was cinema's ultimate poet of weathered soulfulness. With his gaunt frame, sorrowful eyes, and understated style, he could convey more grief, wisdom, or dry humor by staring off into the desert distance than most actors could deliver in a five-minute monologue.
Roger Ebert famously coined the Stanton-Walsh Rule: no movie featuring either Harry Dean Stanton or M. Emmet Walsh in a supporting role can be altogether bad. Across a six-decade career with over 200 credits, Stanton grounded every scene he entered with an unforced, Zen-like authenticity.
Defining Performances
Paris, Texas (1984): Wim Wenders gave Stanton his first major starring role as Travis Henderson, a mute wanderer emerging from the desert to reassemble his fractured past. Stanton spends the film's opening stretch without speaking a word, letting his posture and eyes carry the emotional narrative.
Repo Man (1984): Playing Bud, a cynical, speed-fueled repo veteran opposite Emilio Estevez, Stanton delivered cult-classic lines with deadpan grit and anti-establishment swagger.
Alien (1979): As Brett, the weary Nostromo technician in a Hawaiian shirt, his relaxed, blue-collar pragmatism gave Ridley Scott's sci-fi horror its essential real-world grounding.
Twin Peaks: The Return (2017): Reprising his role as trailer park manager Carl Rodd, David Lynch captured Stanton’s genuine, late-life grace in some of the series' most quiet and tender scenes.
Lucky (2017): A poetic screen farewell, starring Stanton as a 90-year-old atheist in a remote desert town confronting his own mortality—a character tailored closely to his actual personality.
Off-screen, Stanton was a troubadour who regularly sang Mexican rancheras and classic country tunes in Los Angeles clubs. He lived simply, embraced philosophies of non-attachment, and brought that exact unvarnished truth to every frame he occupied.
David Lynch and Harry Dean Stanton weren't just frequent collaborators—they were soulmates in cinematic minimalism and close personal friends off-screen. Lynch understood how to harness Stanton's natural state of "just being" better than almost any other director, while Stanton brought an unforced, quiet humanity to Lynch's surreal, often terrifying visual landscapes.
The Creative Dynamic: Stillness and "Just Being"
Lynch famously remarked that Stanton understood the most crucial element of film acting: doing nothing. Where other actors felt the urge to perform or fill quiet moments with emotion, Stanton possessed the rare ability to sit completely still, smoke a cigarette, and let an entire lifetime of experience radiate through his face.
Their creative language was built on shared philosophical wavelengths. Off-set, they spent decades hanging out, smoking, drinking coffee, and discussing transcendental meditation, eastern philosophy, and the nature of non-existence. Lynch rarely gave Stanton heavy technical direction; instead, he framed scenes around Stanton's presence, treating him less like a character actor and more like an elemental force.
Timeline of Their Works
Wild at Heart (1990) — Johnnie Farragut: Stanton played a gentle private investigator searching for Laura Dern's character. In a movie filled with hyper-stylized violence and absurdity, Stanton was the quiet, tragic heart holding the narrative together.
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992) — Carl Rodd: Introduced as the weary manager of the Fat Trout Trailer Park, Stanton delivered iconic lines like "I've already suffered for the year" with an effortless, weary dignity.
The Straight Story (1999) — Lyle Straight: In Lynch’s most straightforward G-rated masterpiece, Stanton appears only at the very end as the estranged, stroke-afflicted brother. Without saying a word for minutes, the gaze exchanged between Stanton and Richard Farnsworth provides one of the most emotional climaxes in cinema history.
Inland Empire (2006) — Freddie Howard: A small, surreal role as a broke Hollywood producer asking people for twenty-dollar loans, effortlessly sliding into Lynch's fragmented nightmare logic.
Twin Peaks: The Return (2017) — Carl Rodd: Reprising his Fire Walk with Me role, Carl became the moral and spiritual center of the series. Lynch crafted one of the most heartbreaking scenes in modern television around Stanton quietly witnessing a tragic hit-and-run and watching a soul ascend into the sky.
The Role Reversal: Lucky (2017)
Their dynamic culminated in a fitting final chapter with Lucky, directed by John Carroll Lynch. Stanton played the lead role—a thinly veiled version of himself confronting his own mortality—and David Lynch stepped in as an actor to play his best friend, Howard, a man grieving his lost pet tortoise. Watching Lynch deliver a tender monologue while Stanton listened served as a moving real-life tribute to their multi-decade friendship shortly before Stanton's death in 2017.
1. Mortality and "The Nothing"
Lucky is a staunch "realist." He defines realism as the practice of accepting a situation as it is. For him, death is not a transition to an afterlife, but the end of consciousness. The film explores how one finds the courage to "smile" at that nothingness.
2. Routine as Survival
The film emphasizes the dignity and weight of daily habits. Lucky’s morning exercises and specific walking routes aren't just chores; they are the framework that keeps him connected to the world.
3. Community and Solitude
While Lucky prides himself on being "alone but not lonely," the film highlights the quiet network of people who care for him—the diner staff, the bar owner, and even the "annoying" life insurance salesman.
Production and Context
Filming Location: The movie was filmed in Cave Creek, Arizona, and parts of Los Angeles. The stark, sun-drenched desert landscapes reflect the isolation and clarity of Lucky's worldview.
Biographical Elements: Much of the film is semi-autobiographical. Lucky’s Navy service in the Pacific, his love for game shows, and even his specific brand of cigarettes (American Spirits) were taken directly from Harry Dean Stanton’s actual life.
Stanton's Legacy: Stanton passed away at age 91, just two weeks before the film's theatrical release. Critics noted that the line between the character and the actor was almost non-existent, making it one of the most authentic and vulnerable performances in modern cinema.
President Roosevelt: A running subplot involves Howard (David Lynch) grieving the escape of his pet tortoise, President Roosevelt. This serves as a metaphor for the slow, inevitable journey we all take. Howard's genuine heartbreak over a creature that "has nowhere to go and all the time in the world to get there" provides a surreal comic relief.
The Birthday Party: Lucky attends a Mexican-American child's birthday party and performs a moving, acappella rendition of the song "Volver, Volver." This scene highlights Lucky's connection to the Hispanic community in his town and reveals a rare moment of emotional vulnerability.
The Final Monologue: At the bar, Lucky delivers a speech about "the void," concluding that because everything is temporary, the only appropriate response to the inevitability of death is to smile.
The Tortoise Finale: The film's final image—a tortoise walking slowly through the desert landscape—suggests a sense of endurance and the persistence of life beyond the individual.
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