If you met him in person, David Lynch came across as a Midwestern pastor, all gee-whiz and aw-shucks. He was one of the few people who seemed wholly incapable of irony and, hearing him talk, you’d think the man must have enjoyed a pretty darn nice Montana childhood.

Steven Spielberg knew what he was doing when he cast David Lynch as John Ford in The Fabelmans; already, in 2022, the director had become, like Ford, bigger than his movies, a living monument to cinema.