catapult magazine

Lynch introduced the film as “a nightmare in the city of dreams” to film festivals.

When Jay Leno asked David Lynch to explain what was going on in “Mulholland Drive” , Lynch began lecturing him about how films speak in their own language, and that he’d be doing an injustice to the story of the film by summing it up in just a few short words. Leno asked him if he was refusing to explain the movie. And Lynch said, “Yes, Jay, that’s exactly what I’m doing.”

I think Mulholland Drive should be explained/understood though. To get started, try thinking about the events of the film in this way. Put the two “characters”, the blonde and brunette, together as the same person, one being the regular girl with a dream to be a movie star, the other as the fantasy, as the woman the blond wants to be. Of course, in typical Lynch fashion, you can never have what you most desire, and once you think you have it, it escapes you (he stole that from “Vertigo”), so of course the blonde doesn’t get what she wants and you know what happens.

Well, anyway, that’s just to get us started…

I finally saw the latest David Lynch movie – Mullholland Drive. For those of you that have viewed it, what is your response? I certainly loved it, and knew to expect the unexpected (unlike the rest of the audience who were yelling for their money back, post viewing). Do you think the whole point in understanding the plot was to not understand (and just understand it as a “Lynch”)? Or was there some statement he was trying to make? Your thoughts?Mullholland Drive

I watched it yesterday and I’m kind of ambivalent about it. Lynch’s movies are frustrating for me. I liked the bizzareness of Mulholland Drive and I liked making all the cool little connections but ultimately, I didn’t get it. I have ideas about various points he makes— like what you say, Grant, about how you don’t get what you want. Or that old people you meet in planes are actually boogie men. Or that the universe consists of several realities and you get batted back and forth whether you like it or not. But I have yet to realize what it all meant as a whole. And maybe it wasn’t supposed to convey anything is particular. Maybe Lynch just likes to throw in mysterious blue boxes and laugh at our puzzled expressions. In which case, I’m rather annoyed at being toyed with.

Just thought I’d share another (very large) piece to the Lynch puzzle. I saw it last night. It’s “Sunset Boulevard”. Besides the obvious similarity in title to Lynch’s “Mulholland Drive”, this classic film shares many of the same themes. And there’s so much craziness (i.e. mental insanity) and dream stuff going on in it that I’m sure it is one of Lynch’s favorites. Has anyone seen this movie and can testify to the similarities?

Oh yeah, and I was thinking about that scene where the blond is forced to take off her clothes at gunpoint in front of Mr. Eddy in “Lost Highway” and wondered if the gun was really necessary. I mean, it’s not like Mr. Eddy forced her to be there; and as far as I can tell, he’s running a porno operation, not a mafia. Then I started to think about the way Lynch uses word connotations to tell his stories. I’m pretty sure the cocked gun is meant to represent the camera that encourages characters to do things they wouldn’t ordinarily do, that quite literally “shoots” them in their most intimate moments. ‘If someone can look sexy at gunpoint, then they’ll do fine in front of the camera’ must have been Mr. Eddy’s rationale behind the “audition”. This kind of symbolic use of the gun is going on in “Sunset Boulevard” as well. Can anyone think of places where this gun-camera relationship is used elsewhere in Lynch’s films?

I smell a thesis!

Also Lost Highway…when freaky-ass Robert Blake comes out of the house which eventually explodes (or did explode and imploded back together) with the video camera, and Fred (who was just Pete) is terrified, gets in the car and tears off as if he’s being chased away by a man with a gun. But it’s really just a camera. Fred fears cameras in general. Earlier in the film it’s stated that he won’t have one in the house or refuses to own one.

That’s right! I forgot about that. Being caught on film doing things you don’t remember is all the more horrifying for one who didn’t think he had a gun in the house! Man, I love Lynch.

I saw Mullholland Drive a couple of months ago on DVD with a couple of my friends. We really enjoyed it and actually watched it over again.

The only other Lynch movie I have ever seen is his rendition of dune. (Though I love the Dune novels I believe that this cannot be near Lynch’s best)

Well, I’m starting from nothing besides watching Mullholland Drive twice, but it seems to be a commentary on Hollywood and Filmmaking. I seem to be behind because you all seem to have that as an unspoken assumption about most of his films, the ones I haven’t seen.

What do you think about the Cowboy?

And what about the “show” and the singer?

I have Ideas of what I thought it was about and how it fit together but I would appreciate any thoughts you could share.

Thanks,

Sam

How about reviving a dead discussion?
I just saw Blue Velvet this weekend for the second time. I had seen it years ago and remembered about three things: Dennis Hopper (Frank) huffing the amyl nitrate and then acting out some childhood sexual fantasy, Issibella Rossilieni (Dorthy) standing naked on the the lawn, and also that Jeffery likes Hieneken. And I just thought of the fact that I missed a great opportunity to reference Blue Velvet when my friend ordered a Heineken last night. Crap.
Anyway, when I first saw Mulholland Dr., I thought he had finally accomplished what he was trying to do in Lost Highway, but I now I think he was just updating Blue Velvet. They’re so similar. What is his obsession with the two women, one light and one dark? I also noticed that both plots revolve around an investigation, something that starts out with a playful curiousity and then getting wrapped up into some horrid nightmare. Lynch is also doing something in Mulholland Dr which he did more explicitly (wait, does he do anything explicitly?) in Blue Velvet, which is to force us to both listen and to not listen at the same time. Music and sound is extremely important in Lynch fims but a lot of the dialogue in both movies is so bland, but it can get punctuated with the images on screen or by someone like Frank in Blue Velvet, who is verbally violent, but whose dialogue often times is just as meaningless as the banalities. In some ways, it seems likeLynch is pushing us away from the dialogue, like he’s playing with our dependence upon it to move the storyline forward.
In both of these movies, there’s also a desire to tear off a facade. In Blue Velvet it’s pretty up front, especially at the beginning when, after a montage of scenes from this idyllic town, an old man has a heart attack and we see the ground beneath him is filled with noisy, chewing insects. Mulholland Dr., of course, has the whole Hollywood glam thing exposed. It’s like there’s two different worlds in Lynch’s universe, the one that we all think we live in, and then the world he sees, which we enter into through some sort of portal. In Mul Dr, it was the blue box, and in Blue velvet, it’s the severed ear, which early in the picture, we literally enter via the camera. At the denounment of BV, we pull back out from an ear, this time Jeff’s, and the happy world is back like nothing ever happend. But then they see a robin, which had eariler been mentioned as some sort of symbol for redemption or something. Basically, hope/light/positive; i don’t remember the exact words. But the bird is so incredibly fake, you can tell it. It’s undoubtably animatronic, and it’s got one of those bugs that we saw at the beginning in its mouth. Love conquers all? I don’t get it. Is it sentimental, or are we supposed to see the lie behind it all? Same thing with Mulholland Dr with its final montage of the pre-fallen naomi watts. Is that ending sentimental? Is it mourning innocence lost? It almost seems like it but I can’t tell. I’m not even sure there is such a thing as innocence lost in Lynch’s world; it’s more like discovering yourself.
There’s lots of ramblings in there. Basically, if anyone is still trying to figure out Mulholland Dr, go rent Blue Velvet again or for the first time.

I see the relationship between Blue Velvet and Lost Highway paralelling Hitchcock’s Psycho and Vertigo. I tend to attribute the blonde-brunette obsession to Hitchcock’s Vertigo. The “You’ll never HAVE me” statement near the end of Lost Highway reminds me of the entire premise of Vertigo. The voyeurism of the closet scene in Blue Velvet reminds me of the little peep-hole in Psycho…and the prominence of the knife in Blue Velvet seems to suggest another connection to Psycho. Were there any large birds of prey mounted on walls in Blue Velvet? I don’t remember.

I think you’re right about that Psycho thing. In fact, on the DVD, one of the special features has a 30 sec clip of Siskel and Ebert where Ebert was offended by it because he felt Lynch was abusing his actors, but also said that it challenges you by making you think about your reactions to it. Siskel liked it and compared to Psycho because all of a sudden you find yourself in too deep. “shocking, but mesmerizing” I believe were his words. I think I would add that in both movies are shocking in that you’re blindsided by some sort of sexual experience and the rest of the time is like after a car accident, lots of pain and confusion. Hey, maybe that’s why Lynch likes using car accidents. Siskel also said Lynch, like every good director, wants to play you like a paino (a quote attributed to Hitchcock).
One difference I’m interested in, although it may mean nothing, is that with Lynch, color is so bloody important, especially the red and the blue, but in Psycho, Hitchcock used black and white. It was made in 1960, so he had the option of using color at the time but decided not to. He wasn’t the only person still using black and white, but still…. I don’t know, maybe it’s nothing. Perhaps it’s that thing about how Hitchcock doesn’t want to get too close and Lynch moves way in.

I would love seeing a detailed study of Hitchcock and Lynch. Why don’t you get on that, Grant? Have that for me by Thanksgiving. 10,000 words, double spaced, MLA style.

I don’t remember any stuffed animals, unless you count the severed ear.

A note worthy Lynch film, which has been sadly overlooked here, is The Straight Story (1999). Far from the outlandish, wacked out adventures of lynchendum found in Mullholand Drive or Lost Highway, The Straight Story is an incredible tale of a man, on a riding mower, determined to make right a wrong relationship and the effect he has on those who happen upon his path. Any one seen it?