David Lynch Was Proud of All of His Projects Except This One Iconic Film He Deemed a 'Total Failure'

The director said years before his death that his third feature film was a "total failure" in his eyes

David Lynch revealed one of his biggest career regrets years before his death. 

The celebrated director of Mulholland Drive, Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks died just days before his 79th birthday, his family announced on Thursday, Jan. 16.

Before his death, he revealed on his YouTube channel in June 2020 that despite the cult status of his 1984 film, Dune, it was the project he is the least proud of.

Related: David Lynch, Twin Peaks Creator and Mulholland Drive Director, Dies at 78: 'There's a Big Hole in the World'

Lynch directed the 1984 adaptation of Dune, based on the 1965 sci-fi Frank Herbert novel, that starred Kyle MacLachlan, Virginia Madsen, Patrick Stewart, Linda Hunt and José Ferrer.

“I'm sort of proud of everything except Dune,” he admitted in the video titled "Do You Have a Question For David? Part 1."

"I’ve liked so much working in different mediums," Lynch continued. "It’s not a thing about pride, it’s more like the enjoyment of the doing, enjoyment of the work."

The Eraserhead director added, "I’ve just enjoyed working in all these different mediums and I feel, again, really lucky to have been able to enjoy those things and be able to live."

Lynch had previously spoken about his dissatisfaction with the sci-fi film. Two months before he admitted he wasn’t proud of the feature, he told The Hollywood Reporter that “it was a heartache” for him. 

He also revealed he had “zero interest” in seeing Denis Villeneuve’s recent adaptations, starring Timothée Chalamet, Oscar Isaac, Jason Momoa, Josh Brolin and Zendaya.

“It was a failure, and I didn’t have final cut,” he explained to the outlet in April 2020. “I’ve told this story a billion times. It’s not the film I wanted to make. I like certain parts of it very much — but it was a total failure for me."

Additionally, the year prior, in July 2019, he said during a virtual Q&A that the film was the “huge, gigantic sadness in my life.”

“Total creative control, I didn’t have it,” he explained, adding, “The film is not the film I would’ve made had I had that final control. It’s a bit of a sadness.”

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Related: Kyle MacLachlan Mourns David Lynch: 'I Owe My Entire Career, and Life Really, to His Vision'

Still, the cast of Dune remembered Lynch fondly, honoring him with tributes after news of his death.

"Forty-two years ago, for reasons beyond my comprehension, David Lynch plucked me out of obscurity to star in his first and last big budget movie. He clearly saw something in me that even I didn’t recognize. I owe my entire career, and life really, to his vision," wrote MacLachlan, 65, on Instagram.

Alicia Witt, a child star from Dune, wrote that Lynch "showed me who i was. on a core level. an actor. a channeler. how would i ever have know such things existed as a possibility if not for him?"

The Longlegs actress, 49, added, "from the first moment he directed me in jane jenkins’ casting office in nyc at my audition for Dune, i felt like i was being seen for the first time. finding a power inside my soul like a seed uncoiling. i can remember the feeling, the communication between us, that i’d follow him anywhere in my mind and he’d lead me to not *play* alia, but to become alia."