With the news that Twin Peaks — David Lynch and Mark Frost’s unlikely ABC smash hit — is celebrating its 20th anniversary, now seems like a fine time to re-present this appreciation from the Horse’s archives. Enjoy.

A MAN LAYS DYING on the floor of a jail cell between two mountains of the Pacific Northwest. Not even two weeks ago, despite his middle-age, he’d had a head of youthfully dark hair; now, it is completely, shockingly, all-white. The sprinkler system of the sheriff’s department that holds him has been set off, creating the effect of a tumultuous indoor downpour that rains down upon the white-haired man and his captors.

One of his captors — the very one who has most doggedly pursued him — is kneeling down. The white-haired man has committed the kind of unthinkable crimes that would disgust and shake most of us to the core, but Special Agent Dale Cooper instead remains very much with the moment. He holds the white-haired man, stroking his hair, comforting him even as the horrors of his crimes are finally admitted between last gasps. Then, Cooper speaks. The words come to him naturally:

“Leland,” he says, “the time has come for you to seek the path. Your soul has set you face to face with the clear light and you are now about to experience it in all its reality, wherein all things are like the void and cloudless sky, and the naked, spotless intellect is like a transparent vacuum, without circumference or center. Leland, in this moment, know yourself, and abide in that state. . . Look to the light, Leland. Find the light.”

Though spoken as much from the heart as from the head, Coop’s words are not truly his own. Compare them with this famous passage from The Tibetan Book of the Dead, meant to be recited to the dying as they pass on:

“O, nobly-born [so and so by name], the time hath now come for thee to seek the Path [in reality]. Thy breathing is about to cease. Thy guru hath set thee face to face before with the Clear Light; and now thou art about to experience in its Reality in the Bardo state, wherein all things are like the void and cloudless sky, and the naked, spotless intellect is like unto a transparent vacuum without circumference or centre. At this moment, know thou thyself, and abide in that state.” [W.Y. Evans-Wentz (translator and editor), The Tibetan Book of the Dead (Oxford, Third edition, 1957)]

Leland, though in his final moment, is surprised, almost smiling, in response to Coop’s urging that he find the light: “I see it!”

“Into the light, Leland,” Coop says, ” Don’t be afraid.”

And with that, Leland Palmer is dead.

It’s unusually moving; hardly your typical primetime TV jailhouse scene.

But this is no ordinary jailhouse, and it’s certainly not ordinary TV.

This is Twin Peaks, where nothing — not family, not FBI-men, not even the owls in the trees — is as it seems. (more…)

The Denver Daily News is reporting on the local premiere of “Mantra,” a new Buddhist horror film:

Mantra tells the story of a group of strangers who go to a remote cabin area in the woods for a meditation retreat. While a generous amount of nudity and gore ensues, the film also explores some heady philosophical concepts like love, desire and suffering.

[Filmmaker David] Wimer was inspired to write Mantra after attending a Buddhist retreat in India. He found that the meditations were “mind-altering, scary and weird,” and became enlightened on the connections between Buddhism — which focuses on desire and suffering — and horror films.

More here.

You may likely have heard by now that John Daido Loori, the founder of the Mountain and Rivers Order of Zen Buddhism has died. He will be missed.

The NY Times published an obit. There are so many things one could say about Daido, and they’ll be said by people far better than me. (The MRO’s mini-site in tribute to Daido does a beautiful job.) That being said, I did want to share this tidbit, being that we talk about Buddhism and tattoos here a good deal. From the Times obit:

Zen Buddhist elders nearly prevented Abbot Loori’s ordination as a monk, after seeing a tattoo peeking from his robe. A Navy souvenir, it depicted an innocent-enough anchor, but Japanese associate tattoos with criminals, and Abbot Loori refused to erase his past.

The ordination finally went ahead. But the abbot wore a bandage over the tattoo when he visited Japan, Newsday reported in 2004.

“I think they were a bit puzzled when I returned year after year and the burn still hadn’t healed,” he said.

Anyway, here’s to Daido, and here’s to not erasing the past.

You gamers (and “evil Buddhists”) might wanna check out this report on Shambhala SunSpace about “Cursed Mountain,” a new game for the Wii that, according to IGN.com:

repurposes Tibetan Buddhism to fuel its survival horror premise. …Cursed Mountain puts players at the control of Eric Simmons, an explorer who takes to the Himalayas in search of his younger brother Frank. Naturally, as Eric he ascends the mountain he’s pulled deeper and deeper into a supernatural world, haunted by the dispossessed as they perpetually linger in a state of Bardo, victims of a curse on the region and in limbo between this life and the next.

Sounds like fun. (And I’m only half-kidding.)

From Kung Fu to Kill Bill and even those cheesy Yellow Book ads he did… the man was a living Dharma-Burger — and that’s no insult (though that ad actually was insulting; you’ll find the Horse’s report on it from a couple of years ago here). How many other people have singlehandledly had such an effect on pop-culture, tempting us to at least begin to explore the worlds of Dharma and martial arts?

He’ll be missed.

So many commercials — car ads, insurance ads, fast food chain ads — are pretty much interchangeable. Everyone’s pretty, the sun is always shining, and no one gets older and loses their hair. (Unless, of course, what’s being pitched has to do with the avoidance of aging, or is a medication for the management of senility.) So kudos to Wendy’s (!) for their new spot. Watch:

Buddhism is of course unafraid to confront aging, sickness, and death. But the advertising industry? Well, let’s just say: not so much. So when Wendy’s chose to run this ad, they may just have broken a little teensy bit of ground. Addressing your customers’ mortality, even in so lighthearted a way, is somehow refreshing. It certainly caught my eye and jarred me a little.

But then, maybe that’s because I’m in the balding-youngish-guy-getting-older demographic. (Not that I’ll be going to Wendy’s any time soon… or, ever.) But what do you think?

Way back, the Horse posted about Buddhist “Hell” theme parks, and also showed you a related sculpture by the artist, Mats!? Well, Mats!? has been going great guns along these lines for a while now with his website and travelog comic, AsiaAdict. To wit, here’s a video he put together, “A little montage consisting of gruesome religious propaganda with a sprinkle of photos of Buddhist Hellparks!”

As one good friend, Joe, says about some Buddhist depictions of Hell and death: “That’s so metal.”

If you want some more, check out Mats!?’s stuff here.

The Philadelphia City Paper has a nice new story about artist/graphic novelist Aaron Birk. An excerpt:

“…the circle of life – death, karma, regeneration – maintains a tight orbit around Birk’s worldview. And for the Maryland-native artist whose hands are rough from working with the earth, the end always justifies the means. ‘If you can just say thank you and be grateful,’ he says in a radio-ready voice stifled slightly by the city’s sudden frost, ‘your whole world opens up. How am I going to use my day? How am I going to use that minute?’

“Birk, who seems equal parts Buddhist, ecologist and unrelenting optimist, has plans for his minute.”

Read the whole story here.

Thanks to reader Micah O, who sent this doozy:

“i dont know if you have seen these but i did at this indian gas station the other day and started laughing

“i thought it was funny they would have to use that symbol to promote something that kills so many and so many struggle with.”

Obviously, he means “funny-weird,” and not “funny-ha-ha.”

Thanks for sending it, Micah.

Really:

So what’s the deal here? Well, this item is one of the most recent pinhole cameras — yes, it works — by the artist Wayne Martin Belger. As Belger explains, the camera is “named ‘Yama,’ [after] the Tibetan God of Death. In Tibetan Buddhism, Yama will see all of life and Karma is the ‘judge’ that keeps the balance. The skull was blessed by a Tibetan Lama for its current journey and I’m working with a Tibetan legal organization that is sending me to the refugee cities in India.”

He goes on to explain that Yama was designed for two series of photographs, the first being Belger’s “interpretation of the modern incarnation of Southeast Asians deities.” The second “will take place in the Tibetan refugee cities of India, a homecoming through the eyes of a 500 year old Tibetan.”

Belger’s cameras — and the photos they take — beg to be seen, not just for their power, craziness, and artfulness, but also because Belger has a unique focus on documenting and transforming suffering.

Other cameras include “Untouchable,” which is “designed to study and photograph a geographic comparison of people suffering from HIV,” and the “Heart Camera,” which Belger says was created “to take photos of soon-to-be mothers who are at least 8 months pregnant, and [to] explore my relationship with my twin brother who died at birth.”

It’s meaningful stuff — sometimes a bit outrageous, sometimes very beautiful, and often both. You can see all of Belger’s cameras on his website, here.