I'm cool with LB being a distant doppelgänger of sorts of the bum.

woolfspersona, it would make sense for that figure in the window to be Louise Bonner. If we saw her up there then it would fit in with your analysis and a lot of elements of the movie.

So I agree it COULD be her (and it would be sweet if it was) but, given that we don't actually SEE her there, is there any evidence that it IS her?

Siku wrote:given that we don't actually SEE her there, is there any evidence that it IS her?

Good point. All I can see is a black hooded person shifting about ... besides it being a homeless woman doppelganger, though, are there any others it could be? Adam? One of the detectives? It's probably important to note that Diane is only unconsciously aware of its presence.

It's Ed.

It's the Blue-haired lady.

Honestly, I think the fact of Diane's darkest persona, the bum, being observed from on high is enough, no matter who it 'really' is. There's no evidence that will reveal this to be one character or another.

Diane is facing her demon (and about to end it all in reponse) so maybe it's her. Maybe it's God (Blue haired women?). Maybe it's all of us - the audience. Maybe it's deliberatly left open.

Ed's got a telescope. and of all the other characters in the movie Ed is the one most likely to be out and about conducting surveillance. It's also a nod to one of dl's fave movies rear window, witnessing a murder from a rear apartment window... so it's Ed with his telescope.

Why would BHL or LB go conduct surveillance on joe and Diane?

It's Ed.

Sorry, I know that closes the book on this discussion, but there's LOTS of other mysteries in MD still unsolved!

Okay, I'll chime in with the voice of the prosaic...

It may not be anyone connected with the film at all.

"Winkie's" exists in real life (or did, as "Caesar's"), and those apartments behind it exist in real life. It seems possible to me, possibly even likely, that the person in the window is simply someone who lives in those apartments, doing her dishes or some such thing. It doesn't look to me like she's wearing a hood. It just looks like she's a dark-haired woman silhouetted in front of the brighter light in the room behind her.

After all, when shooting on location, there's only so much you can do to control the environment around you. It's not like every driver of every vehicle passing by the front of the Winkie's in the Joe & Diane scene is an extra in the film. Similarly, DL may not have had control over the apartment building behind the restaurant, and it may just be a random apartment-dweller.

Just making sure we consider all possibilities...

An accident you say????

JOE
So man, that's unheard of ... an accident
like that ... who coulda foreseen that.

ED
Unreal ... so, you're looking good.
Whatcha doin' these days?

Damn, that would have to be a very creepy accident. I would love to know what was going through Lynch's mind if it was an accident when he noticed it afterwards.

I like the Ed idea, but why is he watching? He's an unexplored character, for me at least. I'm not sure if I understand what his whole work deal was. I know Joe was working for the Castigliane brothers, but what was Ed doing and what were the people that Joe shot doing? What sort of company was it? Something to do with telephones?

Do we have any reason to believe Ed even exists? At least under the classic interpretation, Diane hired Joe as a hit man, and the scene between Joe and Ed was part of a dream.

I dunno... to me, it doesn't really look like the figure in the window is "watching." It looks like someone moving around in their kitchen (you can see them turn this way and that, like they're working with items on their kitchen counter). If they were "watching," I'd expect them to be more focused on looking out the window than this person seems to be.

If it was a "happy accident," then presumably it couldn't be Louise or Ed, because if it was an "accident," then it wasn't Lee Grant or Vincent Castellanos up in that window...

it is shown that Ed was at least in some small way involved in the hit on Camilla, opening scene of the movie ... Ed and Joe talk about it while laughing that people (Betty and Rita) think it was an accident. "Unreal."

So Ed is involved in the goings on, behind the scenes, how many times do I have to point out that Ed's possession of a telescope in his office is the most obvious and clear indicator that he is a guy who spies on people, and ultimately keeps track of what they do in a book called the history of the world. So really folks. It's Ed.

i wanted to talk about Lynch and accidents for a bit. I think Lynch is open to accidents, but I am going to call them planful accidents. Let's review the most famous story of how Bob was created in TWIN PEAKS. The guy who ended up playing Bob was a prophand trying to keep out of the shot hiding behind furniture. And Lynch tells this story of how casting Bob was an accident.

BUT!!!!!!

does Lynch say he only thought of the character of Bob in a serendipitous moment? I don't believe so, I believe long before they started shooting, Lynch had an idea of an entity that would represent "The Evil That Men Do." An entity that possesses people, maybe in Lynch's mind it could have started off as black smoke, or maybe a more run of the mill devil, but then, in that wonderful moment of seeing Frank Silva hiding behind furniture trying to stay out of the shot, then it came to him the beauty, weirdness, and horror of such a thing.

Basically, here is what I have to say. Lynch has ideas. Accidents can fit into those ideas in those magical moments, but accidents do NOT change the idea.

So the question remains, even if it was an accident, WHY did Lynch leave it there, it's something he surely would have noticed during the shooting, someone would have pointed it out to him, there's 2 other ADs and continuity guys all on the scene. Accident? Ok, so why leave it in the shot? How does it work in Lynch's most important inspiration: The Idea.

It's Ed.

In the scene between Ed and Joe, Joe's eyes are different colors; in the Winkie's scene with Diane, his eyes are the same color. The scene with Ed and Joe is part of a dream. Ed is a figment of Diane's dream imagination... her mind's way of explaining what Joe's book was and where he got it. We never see Ed or hear anyone refer to him outside of the dream. Ed doesn't exist.

Ok, so if Joe can exist both inside and and outside the dream, doesn't that only prove.... so can Ed?

"Can" he? Sure. But we don't have any particular reason to believe he *does*.