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Reader comments on
Subject: Re: life imitating art
Date: Oct 20, 2002
I haven't read all the postings here but I think David Lynch was trying to tell the story in a way that is similar to the outline Steve B laid out. The concept that makes the most sense to me is that David Lynch is telling a story about the thoughts that occur between the time the bullet enters Diane/Betty's brain and the time of complete silence. The bizarre parts are the disjoint collections of thoughts from Diane's mind, already suffering from mental illness and now further damaged by the bullet, as her life drains away over a second or two. The concept of her life "flashing before her eyes".
As many have pointed out, part of the movie portrays the real story but most of the movie follows Diane's disturbed and disrupted thoughts as she lays dying. One of the things David Lynch is playing with in the movie is the strange way our minds take real things and turn them into abstract concepts in our dreams. If you follow the movie by tying the abstract concepts back to the real things that created the dream abstractions, then it makes more sense.
One of the main themes is tied to fact that this is a "death dream". Diane cannot wake up from this horrible nightmare as she dies and her mind is struggling with abstractions around that reality. The blue box represents the terrible reality of her impending death as her mind tries to comfort itself with happy thoughts. The blue key representing the confirmation of Camilla's death is transformed into the strange blue key that unlocks the blue box confirming Diane's death.
The true story is one of a small town girl coming to Hollywood with dreams of stardom after he aunt leaves her some money. While unsuccessfully trying to find an acting job, she meets and falls in love with Camilla and is subsequently discarded by her. Diane degenerates into drug abuse/insanity and hires a hitman to kill Camilla using her aunts money. Eventually, the drugs, insanity and her concience drive her to suicide.
This leads to all the bizarre scenes. The real blue key abstracting to the wierd blue key. Her impending death abstracting to the blue box. Her mind struggling with the fact that this is a death dream abstracting to the theatre scene where she is told "it's all a recording" where she even sees herself shaking as her real body convulses from the brain injury.
Many scenes are simply disjointed thought abstractions. The "Betty" girl who waited the table when she paid the hit man leads to name change. The recall of a man standing at the counter at this same time is transformed into an abstraction of facing impending death. Real people seen at the party where Camilla's announcement devastated her, such as the director's mom, become different characters in her death dream.
In my opinion, David Lynch is telling a story about a place none of us ever return from - the last thoughts that go through our mind before we die. This particular death dream is extra weird due to mental illness, bullet-induced brain damage, regret of killing a true love and the happy thoughts of what success in Hollywood could have meant. Her mind is attempting to comfort itself with happy thoughts while the horrible truth of impending death and what led up to this constantly intrude.
The movie all seems to make sense to me when viewed from this perspective. Just connect the reality->abstraction links...
D
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life imitating art
I was just thinking that the girls are crying in the scene in club silencio because the spanish singer is telling them to... Life imitates art...
Betty and Rita's "lives" if you will were imitating art (movies) from the 40's and 50's -- a kinder, gentler form of film-making. Where dark deeds were noir.
Diane and Camella's "lives" imitated art (movies) from the 90's and 2K. Sexual infidelity/experimentism, despondancy, homelessnes, gritty realism, drug addiction, murder -- these all populate modern film making.
Maybe it wasn't so much the same story told through different psychological states but the same story told from different genres: noir and realism.
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Comment index:
wow from Rosanna, Jun 10, 2002
Re: wow from Joshua (editor of Offoffoff), Jun 12, 2002
Re: wow from Tashtigo707, Jun 17, 2002
PCP from Kilgore Trout, Sep 1, 2002
Aunt??? from HugeElvis, Oct 14, 2002
» Re: life imitating art « from Dilbert, Oct 20, 2002
wow from Rosanna, Jun 10, 2002
Re: wow from Joshua (editor of Offoffoff), Jun 12, 2002
Re: wow from Tashtigo707, Jun 17, 2002
PCP from Kilgore Trout, Sep 1, 2002
Aunt??? from HugeElvis, Oct 14, 2002
» Re: life imitating art « from Dilbert, Oct 20, 2002
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