Thursday, January 08, 2004

Mulholland Drive 

The Girl was telling me about a bizarre dream she had the other night (the details of which I won't reveal here), and she speculated that it would be wild if you could have your dreams turned into a film. They'd make sense, but then get strange and illogical, then make a little sense, and on and on. I immediately replied that I think that's exactly what David Lynch does.

Back when Mulholland Drive was garnering all sorts of awards, The Girl agreed to go see it at a local art house cinema (they have the BEST popcorn), even though she adamantly clung to her opinion that she didn't care what awards it was getting, it's David Lynch and he's psychotic. Nevertheless, off we went.

So the story is moving along, and while it did have some Lynchian oddness, it was actually shaping up nicely into both a suspenseful mystery and a nice lesbian love story. I was speculating about how it would turn out, I was rooting for the characters, when BAM!!! It went into full Lynch mode. Not only did it go off into all different directions, with a cast of bizarre characters and flashbacks, but it managed totally to take all the enjoyment I had been reaping from the film to that point out to the back of the theater, beat it to a pulp, turn it inside out and upside down, and throw it back into the theatre, slowly to stew into a bitter resentment.

My theory is that David Lynch's dreams make sense, and that the first part of the movie was a big-screen depiction of one of those dreams, but then the end was what he created after he woke up. Of course he had to impose the responsibility for the dream onto one of his characters, just to tie it all together.

If you see a little wooden box on your nightstand, just let it be. Silencio.

Reality Check: As I think you could guess, The Girl not only hated the movie, but loves to remind me that she warned me. The Guyfriend is adding it to his Netflix list, just to see what he thinks of it.
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Posted by Rogueslayer at 1/08/2004 01:25:00 PM