The Alphabet

Watch "The Alphabet" (1969) online on iFILM — David Lynch's earliest surviving short film, made while he was still a student at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Four minutes of hand-drawn animation and live footage, centered on actress Peggy Reavey reciting the alphabet as the letters mutate, scream and turn grotesque around her.

Lynch shot this before Eraserhead, before Blue Velvet, before any of it. Yet the unease is already fully formed: familiar symbols warped into something hostile, a mundane act twisted until it looks like a fever dream. At under five minutes, it's the most efficient horror Lynch ever made. Stream "The Alphabet" (1969) on iFILM.