Mulholland Drive

Bomb Rating: 

Four words: hot naked lesbian sex.

Four words: hot naked lesbian sex. Let me explain exactly how this got into "Mulholland Drive." This film was originally a television series pilot that David Lynch made and presented to TV executives, who viewed the thing and didn't have the slightest idea what to make of it because they're stupid and Lynch is a freak. They handed it back and said "no thanks", and Lynch promptly went off and turned it into a feature film by adding the hot naked lesbian sex. He figured if he was going to make a feature-length film, he might as well get the lead actresses to disrobe. This is David Lynch in a nutshell.

In "Blue Velvet," he wanted to see Isabella Rossellini naked, so he wrote some preposterous scene where she runs around naked. In "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me," he wanted to see Sheryl Lee and Moira Kelly naked, so he concocted orgy scenes. In "Lost Highway" he got Patricia Arquette to strip. And, of course, let's not forget the Mr. Penis swinging dance number performed by Richard Farnsworth in "The Straight Story" -- something of an anomaly, yes, but still Lynchian.

The only reason David Lynch makes movies is for the naked people. You can tell the exact point in "Mulhalland Drive" where Lynch added footage that wasn't included in the television version, because the previously unidentifiable attraction between Betty (Naomi Watts) and Rita (Laura Harring) turns into full-blown naked lesbianism exactly 86 minutes in.

Beyond that, this film is typical bizarre Lynch. The movie begins with Rita getting in a car crash and wandering around LA not remembering stuff. She runs into Betty, an aspiring actress, and they room together. The two are like two halves of the same person. Betty is the actress wannabe whose naiveté leads her to believe she'll "make it." Rita has been through something ugly and is like Betty's walking unconscious. Basically, this is like any other Lynch film -- there are always two sides to the movie: the facade of the imagined fantasy life, and the ugliness of what truly is. Not as hard to figure out as one might imagine, and not all that interesting, especially since it's like the seventh Lynch film to do exactly the same thing.

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