1986
Directed by
David Lynch
Themes
•Sex
•Violence
•Crime
•Power
•The myth of the American Dream
Genres
• Throwback to art film and 50s B movies
• Teenage romance
• Film noir
• Mystery-suspense
• Psycho-sexual thriller
Davis Lynch’s Filmography
1977
1980
1984
1990
1992
1997
2001
2006
What’s next?
Twin Peaks
Season 3
2016……It’s happening
Lynch and Frost
reunited
Was it well received?
Response in 1986
• highly ridiculed and disdained when released as an extreme,
dark, vulgar and disgusting film
• won critical praise - Best Film of 1986, Best Director, Best Supporting
Actor (Dennis Hopper) and Best Achievement in Cinematography
(Frederick Elmes) by the National Society of Film Critics
• Nominated for best director at the Oscars (but who cares about those
jerks)
Stylization
• The film's credits (viewed with fluid, scripted type-lettering) play
above a slowly undulating blue velvet, fabric backdrop
• Angelo Badalamenti's sensual soundtrack (Lynch has always worked
with Badalamenti
• The mark of a true auteur
• The film dissolves into an unnaturally brilliant, visually lush, boldly
colorful opening with patriotic hues (bright red, white, and blue)
• a nostalgic, dream-like view of a clean, conforming, pastoral America
like those in Norman Rockwell’s paintings.
Scene 1 analysis
• From nearly cloudless, clear aqua-blue skies, the camera tilts and pans slowly
down to a clean white picket fence, in front of which are planted perfect, budding
blood-red roses and yellow tulips. 60s teen idol/crooner Bobby Vinton sings his
rendition of the title song "Blue Velvet" (a song of longing for a woman, written
by Lee Morris and Bernie Wayne). Idyllic small-town images are presented in
silent slow-motion, with hyper-realistic light and color. A bright-red fire engine
truck tranquilly glides down the suburban US street - a friendly fireman on the
running board waves with a dalmatian next to him. At a school cross-walk,
children are safely allowed to walk across the street by a uniformed, matronly
crossing guard holding a Stop sign.
• Outside one of the houses [the Beaumont house], a paunchy man effortlessly
waters his bright-green lawn with a hose. His wife is inside seated on the couch,
watching a daytime mystery/film noir on television (an image of a hand holding a
pistol fills the screen). The husband finds that the snake-like hose is kinked and
wrapped around some of the shrubbery, causing the hose faucet spigot to hiss
loudly and leak water under the increased pressure. Then, the scenes of the
superficial, ideal American dream in the green garden (of Eden) suddenly
explode. He spasms and grabs his neck as he experiences a heart seizure and
stroke, falling on his back to the ground and squirming around in agonizing pain but still gripping the hose, phallically curled around him. Water wildly sprays from
the hose into the air, causing a dog to jump about on his chest and playfully snap
and drink at the stream of water shooting upward. An innocent small boy in
white diapers (and eating a popsicle) waddles down the driveway to look at the
man on the ground, also unaware of what has happened.
• the camera moves from above ground and burrows into the lush, thick green
grass for a closer view of a terrifying, diseased underworld within the placidseeming universe. Penetrating below, it finds a swarm of hungry, ugly black bugs a metaphor for the perverse, horrible evil that lurks beneath the idyllic surface of
picture-perfect life. A few warring, ravenous beetles - ugly insects - are in a
ferocious, predatory, and cannibalistic fight for life, amplified aurally and visually.
• The next shot is the welcoming billboard of the town: "Welcome to Lumberton,"
and a slow pan views the waterfront of the logging town. A jingle from the local
radio station plays a chorus of "Lumberton," and while the sounds of a chain saw
and falling timber play, the radio announcer ominously invites the locals:
• It's a sunny, woodsy day in Lumberton, so get those chain saws out. This is the
mighty W-O-O-D. At the sound of the falling tree, it's 9:30. There's a whole lot
of wood out there, so let's get goin'.
Source: Fimsite.org