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Mulholland Drive

Mulholland Drive

List Price: $14.98
Your Price: $11.24
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: David's "Drive"
Review: David Lynch has thoroughly, repeatedly, and effortlessly confused us time and time again throughout the years.

He has occasionally stopped along to let us glimpse at the "normal" dementia of humanity("The Elephant Man") and touching hope of the American Spirit("The Straight Story")...

He's also turned on a dime, unfairly invading our minds, haunting our dreams, and perhaps given us something to think about besides our own drab, little world.

"Mulholland Drive" stands to be one that will invade your mind and haunt your dreams. Have no delusions...everything you have heard about this film is TRUE. You won't be able to figure it out upon first viewing. The sexual relationship between Betty and Rita won't make sense. The Cowboy will be an enigma with no handles to grasp onto. Club Silencio will be a familiar place...you couldn't have seen it before, right?

It will shock you and frighten you. It will leave you breathless and frustrated. It will make you think about it long after it's done and then even longer than that.

"Mulholland Drive" is well worth the 2+-hour running time. It's many different things about one thing: the attempt to live what we wished was true; the attempt to escape our lives, our guilt, and our vices through dreams. David Lynch covered this ground before in "Lost Highway", just not as obvious as this film. In "Lost Highway", we were given the story of a man trapped in a circular hell.

In "Drive", we are given the story of two girls attempting to solve a mystery, when in reality, they're trying to find themselves. Something is happening with them...something much bigger than they realize.

David Lynch weaves a tale of mystery, suspence, lust, and terror in a masterpiece that is both an anti-love-letter to Hollywood and an underrated epic of enigmatic film-making. Lynch's best film to date as well as one of the best films of 2001.

Powerful performances by Laura Harring and Naomi Watts as Rita and Betty and a wonderful comeback-cameo for Chad Everett as a sleazy old actor. A triumph of set and sound design also help make this film an instant noir-classic.

Silencio...

--Matt

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Yes, another Lynch film.
Review: June 10, 2002

'Mulholland Drive' is David Lynch's sad and horrendous
valentine to Hollywood myth and the young women without
number sacrificed in body and soul to keep it going.
It is a gaudy but somehow still sentimental tour of
Hellish La-La Land. Like many of his other films,
'Muholland Drive' is both simultaneously enraptured and
disgusted by its subjects, lending the finished project
Lynch's trademark perversity.

An interpretations of the film's narrative is pointless.
I don't know which characters, or incarnations of
characters, or simulations of characters, are meant to
be extant. In the end, it hardly matters. They are
manifestations, not people. Best know that going in.

More problematic is Lynch's need to stray from his main
narrative, his worst habit as a filmmaker, since his
comic deviations are often more enjoyable than the main
action of the film. As is the case here. Some of the
subplots included here, those belonging to the characters
of the Director and the Dimwitted Hit Man, are great fun,
but they vary greatly in tone from the central story
involving the two main female leads. This is especially
damaging in the opening hour of the film, before the
women's tale has become properly engaging. An unwise
move in a film this long.

There is no rating to give a David Lynch film other
than a rating dead in the middle. To some he is
unwatchable, to others untouchable, so best split the

difference. If you haven't seen 'Lost Highway' or 'Blue
Velvet' or any of his other works, there's no point in my
trying to figure out for you whether or not you'd like
them.

Heck, I don't even know if I like them or not. But
they're usually worth a look.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Rollercoster on a double path
Review: Hang on with both hands. This is the grand-daddy of all rides.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: You'll be confused, but haunted nonetheless!
Review: Lynch is either insane or brilliant! I started viewing this with low expectations, given my disappointment in Lost Highway, but the next day and the day after... I was still thinking about this film and curious about Lynch's intent and the layers of mystery. (For great insights, check out the reviews on the Rotten Tomatoes website. Read about his use of color, the connection the the Black Dahlia murder case and other clues to really appreciate this film.) He repeats a lot of themes and metaphors in his films. Fans of Twin Peaks (TV series and the film) and Blue Velvet and Eraserhead will recognize Lynch's techniques. Again and again, he gives us quirky, baffling imagery that both amuses and terrifies. I think ultimately, several of his films to date are progress toward a film not yet made, one that will be his signature piece. I suspect that if the rumor of Lynch making a movie about the Black Dahlia is true, that could be THE movie for Lynch. He certainly is able to create the atmosphere -- we see dreamy, starry-eyed optimism that morphs into desperation and terror. I think that with Mulholland Drive, Lynch is closer to this realization than ever before.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: not worth the time
Review: I ADORE thought provoking hard-edged films(ex. requim for a dream , memento , etc). Anything that will get my curisody to run wild. Laura did quite a good job performance wise.
However this film did NOT impress me at all, it was hyped up to be something it wasnt.
This simply was not a good movie.

My recommendation rent Memento or Donnie Darko instead.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Brilliant.
Review: This is truly a fabulous film. This isn't a film. It's pure art. Check this out if you aren't a square I-only-watch-romantic-comedies movie goer.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: This is a great movie.
Review: Mulholland Drive is very good. The symbolism is typical of David Lynch, so if you like some of his other stuff, it will help you with this one. The movie has very powerful themes (jelosy, betrayal, etc.) which are well developed in the movie.
For the most part the movie is straitforward if you can remember all the parts at the end and put them together. I watched it 3 times in a row to figure out some of what was going on. You almost have to because much is revealed at the end of the movie that will frame how you view the beginning. The following text may give away some of the mystery of the first viewing, or, if you are only going to see it once, it may give you some framework.

The first part of the movie a dream of the real Diane Seldon (who plays Betty in the dream.) The performancies of many of the characters is "shlocky" because it is the fantastic view of Diane. Psycologically, it has been said, the dreamer plays every character. Betty is Diane's vision herself. Rita (played by Harring is Diane's reality love interest) plays a lost Diane, and even becomes to look like real diane. The other characters have Diane issues as well. When Diane awakes we find what the reality is like.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Too Deep
Review: Wow. This movie had so many interesting parts, but it failed to all come together like in the really great movies by this director that my professor made us watch: Blue Velvet, Lost Highway, Elephant Man, and even Eraserhead (which I got during the class discussion, but did not get, to be honest, when I first watched it). Now I know all of the symbolic things that were going on, picked up a few as I watched it, picked up the rest during class discussion, but as a movie there were too many subplots he edited in just because they were cool. The one that really angered me (despite its symbolic value) was the Cowboy; he was so interesting and had so much promise, but as far as the film was concerned, he was outside the plot and therefore superfluous. The thing that saved the movie, was the lesbian sex. Those scenes were hot. Sent me to the shower. I watched them numerous times long after the class had ended, and you will too. It's why I bought the DVD despite not LOVING the film.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Total Depravity
Review: I give this 1 star only because there is no option to give it a big round zero. I admit I should have been forewarned when the description stated nudity was involved, but I foolishly tried it anyway. As I discovered, the words "nudity" and "language" and "violence", etc. did not prepare me for what I was going to see. The only reason I watched it to the end was because I kept waiting to see what the punch line was. Never got it--until later when I realized it was nothing more than an expose of the evils and corruptions of man, who seem to be portrayed as victims who cannot escape being pulled down into and doomed by corruption. How absolutely hideous, and sad. No sense of morality or goodness or beauty or love or even a purpose, not even one of those more and more often lost attributes of a good story. Nothing even in the remotest sense of the word redeeming. Even fun was missing.

All these reviewers who see hidden meanings to be fathomed by those who are intelligent enough don't mention the utter depravity. Yes, that is my opinion just as they have their opinions, and I guess anyone can put any interpretation he dreams up on anything. The way I see it is that if Lynch's point was not to portray man "helplessly" falling into his own garbage, then he was simply dumping HIS garbage on the unsuspecting public. I give him credit for one thing only: his ability to keep one strung along in the hopes of a resolution.

Now, regarding the plot itself, making connections must be a foreign concept to Lynch. Most, if not all, events that take place are not connected to anything and are never resolved. A glaring example is the two women, one who has lost her memory after escaping death and the other who ends up dead, or was dead all along. As for the characters, I would not want to imagine that anyone like any of them could exist even in someone's mind. But I have not seen the darkest corners of the world. The dark corners of my own world are plenty dark enough for me.

The reviewer who said it doesn't take being intellectual to understand this movie was exactly right. It just takes the realization that you are being pulled into hell. Lynch's game-playing is sick. To those who want to be twisted and turned and manipulated, I recommend a movie like "The Game". That involves a joke that could even be considered cruel, but at least it's entertaining and does not end with the sunk feeling that you're in hell and can't escape. It has a point to it, and it is even fun to watch. These concepts most of all escape Lynch in Mulholland Drive.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: A triumph for Lynch...An annoyance for the rest of us...
Review: This movie does exactly what I believe Lynch wanted to do...make an unsolvable puzzle. The movie is filled with too many loose ends for any reasonable interpretation to be the true. Much like some contemporary artists, Lynch is seeking to elicit responses from his audience, rather than convey a message. While such an objective is fine, unfortunately our scholars cannot allow for such a goal. Since they believe everything has a meaning, they will endeavor to find it. Then, they explain the "great answer" that they have found to all of us.

My personal reaction to the movie is negative. The movie did not seem well-made technically. Most importantly, the movie failed to draw me and didn't elicit much of a response from me.


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