Mulholland Drive

Today, I finally understood this movie… and I was amazed by it.

I think what happened to me was exactly the same as what happened to most people: when I saw this movie for the first time, years ago, I didn't understand a thing. That went on for a long time: whenever I saw this film, I ended up not understanding it. That ended today, when I saw it with a friend of mine, who also likes cinema and who told me “you have to keep two things in mind: the first is the non-linear narrative, sometimes with very subtle changes; the second is that most of the film is not real life, it is a dream of the protagonist”.

If there are films that are almost perfect, this one is close to it, although it is not easy to understand, and it is necessary to watch it five or six times to understand it well. I had already the experience that David Lynch's films are not easy... I had my first contact with the director a few years ago, with Blue Velvet, and I realized that he makes hermetic films, with implicit ideas and dreamlike suggestions, which often (almost always) escape our eyes. I like that: it's a challenging kind of cinema, which makes you think and moves you. It doesn't mean that I understand everything! And today, talking with my friend, I finally managed to understand this film better. Initially made in 1999 as a pilot episode for a TV series, it was made into a feature film after TV producers rejected the product. The very way Lynch took his failure and turned it into one of his biggest hits is remarkable, revealing his style and persistence.

The film is really good, and I believe that, by commenting on what I learned today, I am already helping those who want to see it and understand it. If we pay attention, it indicates the moments when the main character falls asleep (right at the beginning) and wakes up again. And I think I can still say, without revealing too much, that the party at the film director's house, very close to the end, is the key scene to unders...

A woman involved in a car accident emerges with amnesia and with the help of a would-be starlet they try to get to the bottom of who did what to whom and why. Thereafter it twists and turns like an adder on steroids - but to what end? Sorry, but I just didn't get it. I'd ask what is it really about, but I am not sure I'd believe anyone who actually claimed to know. Is it really about anything tangible at all or is Lynch daring the audience to admit that they are too dense to grasp the "creative concept" here? It is a well put together piece of cinema, and we do get good performances from Naomi Watts and Justin Theroux, but I just don't inhabit the parallel universe in which this is all set, and it was wasted on me.