Looking back on the madness and chaos of “Blue Velvet”

Salon ^ | 3/26/2016 | Dennis Lim

[PLMerite]

"As beautiful as her mother...."

And her daughter Elettra is no slouch either:

[angryoldfatman]

That sure is a lot of words for “David Lynch is a weird dude.”

[ifinnegan]

This essay went off the rails about half way through. It came back near the end.

It’s Salon, they must be obliged to put in nonsense social commentary. (Well, not just Salon).

“seeing something that was always hidden”

Lynch is upfront about his oeuvre.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Saw it on commercial TV several years later and they had a fifteen minute lead in voiceover explaining the plot, then a voiceover during the movie to explain more.

And was exactly that editing that made the movie more enjoyable for those who hadn't read the book.

AND it was exactly the reason that David Lynch demanded his name be removed from the movie. Watch it again, you'll notice the director's name is now Alan Smithee.

But even with all of that...rain at the end of the movie? Water kills sandworms. Thus effectively killing any chance for a sequel based on the next book.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

I’m probably one of the few people that love Lynch’s “Dune”, including the extended version he refused to put his name on (”Directed by Alan Smithee”).

I like it too. Even when I saw it in the theatre when it was released. I'd read the book and understood all the references to the Great Houses and the The Landsraad. It's all the other Lynch stuff that I dislike. I guess I just don't get it.

[fieldmarshaldj]

It’s true that if you don’t know the references, the movie is going to leave you at a loss. I watched it enough times (at least a dozen or so) that I got everything and appreciated it. I saw the remake for the Sci-Fi channel and didn’t care for it. The actors, wild sets and great score helped make Lynch’s “Dune.”

[Billthedrill]

Quite an essay. One seldom runs into "palimpsest" used in the context of a motion picture. And this: a parallel-universe urtext and a touchstone... is straight from a graduate LitCrit seminar. Come on, Dennis, buddy, somewhere in there is semantic content begging to be let fly free.

I do remember the movie. It was one, like Pulp Fiction, that had me leaving the theater wondering what the hell it was that I just watched but enjoying the ambiguity. That's actually a pretty hard reaction to pull off without being overly pretentious, but Lynch really does have an artistic touch to weirdness that ordinary weirdness doesn't have. I find it easier to enjoy if I don't have an emotional attachment to any of the characters, which is a little off the literary mainstream but there you are. I've often wondered if Lynch has that detachment - there is, I think, a bugs-under-a-microscope aspect to a lot of his stuff. Love to ask him someday.

[Publius]

I enjoyed the movie immensely. The best line in a review that summarized the movie was, “The Hardy Boys go to hell.”

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

The actors, wild sets and great score helped make Lynch’s “Dune.”

And Francesca Annis.