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Reader comments on
Subject: I'm no movie buff, but...
Date: Apr 28, 2002
Hello, all. I just saw this film last night and have been in a tailspin ever since. I enjoyed reading all of your creative and insightful interpretations.
Within the first 20 min of this movie, the freakish and erratic circumstances caused me to start thinking about Jacob's Ladder (remember that one?) and I was kind-of suspicious of a "death flashback" possibility, where everything is an irrational stream of agonal thinking.
Now, forgive me since I have only seen this movie once, but, I get the sense there IS NO REAL glamorous Rita love interest. I agree that Diane/Betty is a failed actress, filled with resentment and scorn. But, I think the lost love is the neighbor, who later returns to coldly retrieve her belongings,and who I think later becomes the target of the scorned lover's (Dianne's) hit. I can't imagine that that hapless, diner-grubbing, misfit of a hitman would be logistically capable of terminating a high profile figure like the glamorous Rita character. But, the neighbor, also a brunette, seems more likely the actual figure behind the Diane fabricated "Rita" image of her. Also, the desperation and hurt Diane feels does not necessarily have to come from such a dramatic source. She is a failed actress, for God's-sake. Are we to believe she just so happens to hang with such a desirable successful actress? Is it possible that the entire engagement announcing scene is also a fatasy where Diane is trying to rationalize a possible and dramatic reason for getting dumped? There is also the matter of the piano ashtray which was repossessed by the neighbor, but seems to reappear during the fantasy acene where glamorous Rita has returned to her.
I'm fishing here. Please help me out with your comments? Thanks.
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Response to this comment:
My take on M. Drive
I just bought this movie on DVD and I have watched it several times. Please excuse my spelling.
Some points I think about the plot:
1 - This movie is NOT told in sequence. David Lynch, by putting the ENTIRE movie on 1 dvd track, seems to not to want to break up his move into sections (thus, giving away where breaks in the movie are). Lynch wants us to use our minds to reorder the movie and not our DVD players.
2 - There are very few scenes in this movie that take place in reality. The first one occurs when Diane is awakened by a woman knocking at the door whom she traded apartments with. This maybe the only scene in the movie that is not a dream or does not have halucination attached to it in some way.
3 - I think the movie REALLY sequentially begins when Diane dreams that Camille is calling her to come to the party. Why do I think this is a dream sequence??? It has to do with the phone she answers, the red lamp that is there, and the ashtray by the lamp. In the movie very few people smoke. This same red lamp, telephone, and ash tray show up at the beginning of the movie as the phone the hitman calls to say that Cammile is still around (and not dead). I think that this phone is Diane's image of what her phone really is. It could be the phone and ash tray and lamp in the apartment of the woman she traded with. They could have forgotten to swap phones. Whatever the technical explanation is about the phones, this dream sequence begins like a fantasy, but like many dreams, it ends as a nightmare. In this party dream sequence I think Diane speaks the truth about herself and her relationship with Camille. This entire sequence is much like a confession. The only thing that is not confessed is that Diane wants to kill Camille. This is admitted in the very next dream scene with the hitman and her. This hiring a hitman dream sequence is more of a reflection of what actually happened. It seems real because it is her memory of what happened between her and the hitman.
4 - All of the scenes at the end of the movie between Diane and Carmilla are delusions/fantasies for Diane.
5 - I think the badly burned person behind the fast food place symbolizes Death. Death has a blue box. The blue box is sort of the mystery of Death. The old couple that spawn from the blue box (the blue box does not look open though) are the judges from the flashback of the dance contest at the beginning of the movie. These are the judges that will take Diane to her death. Diane shoots herself in the end as she is being assaulted by the judges.
6 - After Diane kills herself, she sees Death. She then flashes back to the dance contest and the Judges. The movie ends back in Club Silencio. Showing us that things are not always what they seem.
7 - Next part of the movie sequentially is the beginning of the movie. Diane maybe dead but she is in a dream world. Why do I think she is dead? Well the people that lead her into this world are the Judges from the end of the movie. Also she claims that she comes from Deep River, Ontario. In the last party dream sequence of the movie she indicates her Aunt is dead. In this dream sequence, she says her Aunt has gone to Deep River, Ontario to work on a movie. This parallel seems to be equating Death with Deep River. Also, think of the words: Deep River... Dead bodies end up in deep rivers. Thus, I think Diane is back from the dead is about to try to experience the fantasy of: how she would have liked her life to be.
8 - This initial long dream sequence starts of a a fantasy and slowly evolves into Diane's worst nightmare.
9 - this fantasy starts to transform when the name Camilla is attached to a picture of her (the hollywood headshot). This shows the connection between the characters. This is not a perfect fantasy. Something is going wrong.
10 - Next Diane is whisked away to an audition of a movie where she sees her vision of the female lover of Camilla. She flees from this situation back to Camilla.
11 - Cammila and Diane discover Diane's corpse. This is almost the most horrifying thing Diane can face....
12 - Camilla leads Diane to Club Salincia. Here we learn that Camilla will die. NOTE, The similiarity between the last singer's eye makeup on stage and Cammilla's. It is essentially the same. The singer appears to die and is drug off the stage. It is Diane that is trembling in this scene. Her ultimate horror is Diane dying. In this scene Cammilla finds a blue box in her purse. They both go back to the apartment to try to open the box.
13 - Diane disappears before the blue box is opened. Camilla opens the blue box and nothing is inside it. Immediatly she disappears and drops the box in a Orwellean Kane moment. This is where I think the movie sequentially ENDS. The puzzle of Death is effectively emptiness. Diane does not want to face it, but since she is the one who is dreaming the fantasy, she does through Camilla's eyes.
Anyway, just my 2 cents.
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Comment index:
» I'm no movie buff, but... « from George, Apr 28, 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
» I'm no movie buff, but... « from George, Apr 28, 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
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