Ogwaros Iwenâl

Mocking public figures and the cancer destroying music, while throwing in non-sequiturs like junkie Einstein? Awesome.

After watching Mulholland Drive last night, I went to bed and had a dream.  When I awoke, I felt like a new person.  I don’t mean I was well rested; in fact, I was even more tired than normal.  I don’t mean that the dream changed my outlook on things; the dream was rather materialistic, about a giant personal theater for playing video games (a dream I’ve had before).  I mean out of place, out of time.  Some sort of dimensional shift; like I didn’t belong in this reality.  When you wake, how do you know you are the same person that went to sleep?

It was just a feeling.  Nothing more.

Right?

David Lynch is to weirdness as Michael Bay is to pointless explosions.  Except at least with Lynch, something worthwhile sometimes comes out of the weirdness.  Such is Mulholland Drive (IMDB, Netflix), which is actually very straight forward when you start to really think about it.

Mulholland Drive is a movie about hopes, dreams and desires.  Both the best and the worst aspects of these are on display.  Naomi Watts plays Betty, a bright eyed starlet-to-be who has come to Hollywood to act.  Betty takes in Rita, a sultry amnesiac who shows up after a car accident carrying nothing but a purse filled with money and a mysterious blue key.  Rita’s only memory is of where she was going when the accident occurred – Mulholland Drive.

Meanwhile, a director named Adam Kesher is having no end of problems; he finds his wife cheating on him, powerful players in the industry are interfering with his film, and he is being watched.  In short, his life is really starting to look bleak.  And Adam’s only hope is the advice of a man called simply The Cowboy.

Did I mention there are gratuitous lesbian sex scenes?  Mmm… Naomi Watts.

Okay, the sex scenes are not as gratuitous as they seem at first.  The first half of the movie is permeated by a dream-like quality.  Everything sparkles and shines.  Characters seem like they were plucked out of the 1950s.  Things happen that seem out of place, things that do not seem to fit the flow of the movie.  Even the acting seems quite poor.  However, the second half of the movie makes it clear why all of these things are in fact intentional.

The dividing line between the first half and second half is perhaps the most poignant scene of the movie.  As Rita’s memory returns, Betty and Rita visit the night club Silencio.  The club specializes in playing recordings of music while performers pretend to play along.  Towards the end of the scene, a singer mouths along to a particularly moving Spanish song.  Both Betty and Rita are moved to tears by its beauty.  Suddenly, the singer freezes, passes out, and is dragged off stage all while the recorded song continues.  The illusion is broken.

Very soon after, the illusion of the first half of the movie is broken.  Because the thing that hopes and dreams have in common is illusion.  They are the lies we tell ourselves, for good and for ill.  When the illusion is broken, all we are left with is cold reality.  In this way, Mulholland Drive feels simultaneously like a love letter to and indictment of Hollywood.  Praising the dream of Hollywood and what it provides movie patrons.  Damning the reality of it all.

The genius in this clean division is that characters we’ve grown to like in the first half are suddenly flipped on their heads.  Normally I would condemn this sort of storytelling but it works especially well here, and is perfectly suited to Lynch’s directorial style.  Once Pandora’s Box is opened, even hope escapes.  The idyllic world view is gone making way for a very cruel and spiteful replacement.  It makes for a very heartbreaking movie in the end.

Mulholland Drive isn’t for everyone.  Lynch’s weirdness can definitely be a turn off, as some of it seems simply to be there to set mood.  But love it or hate it, I highly recommend that you watch it.