Welcome to 2026, the year of... Something or other...
Last year I got really obsessed with David Lynch and I want to talk about him because honestly there's nothing else nearly as interesting happening in film than the echoings of stuff made long ago. P.S. I took a film studies class last year and learned, chiefly, to call them "films" instead of "movies." Sorry if any of that pretentiousness leaks through.
What's It Doing?: The principal aim of Blue Velvet (1986) seems to be illustrating the seedy underbelly of picturesque, suburban America. It achieved this with flying colors in a single scene: After 40 minutes of Kyle MacLachlan cruising around sunny Lumberville in his red convertible, chatting with the pink, high school sweetheart Sandy, he sneaks into the apartment of one Dorothy Vallens. In that dark, dark scene, the serenity is cut with the ear-piercing cry of rapist age-regressing homicidal mania. It’s one of these scenes that feels like it lasts three hours, in all of ten minutes. This is when the movie really begins.
Its Symbols: It’s a film about contrasts, like good and evil. The two love interests are polar opposites, light and dark. Images of birds and bugs and contrasted, in the very literal ending as the light eats the darkness. Fire is another important stand-in for passion and violence. The color red, too.
The Controversial Stuff: Sex and taboo are objects of much interest, and Blue Velvet bares it all. The act of watching is important as well as that of driving. I think both might be metaphors for sex-- Watching is utilized by MacLachlan in his junior detective charades, at one point literally watching Dorothy in a sexual act. But at other times it’s more on the nose… Frank seems to get some perverse pleasure from watching musical acts, mostly in the form of 50s music (memories of youth). Driving is also utilized by both Maclachlan and Frank, although to different ends. MacLachlan drives Sandy around in his flashy car, an act which all of her friends instantly attribute to something more intimate. Frank, played by Dennis Hopper, (Who was also a deranged psycho in River’s Edge named “Feck”) won’t stop saying the word “Fuck.” Driving, to him, is a rush like fucking. He actually starts to fuck in his car before getting punched.
Infidelity is another form of taboo which is highly utilized. Sandy is cheating on Mike with Jeffrey, Jeffrey is cheating on Sandy with Dorothy, Dorothy is cheating on Frank with Jeffrey, and Frank is probably cheating on Dorothy with... Who the fuck knows? To some of the characters, this salaciousness is the hottest thing in the world. Oh, the joys of film.
And The Ending?: It's a bit dumb. Stereotypical, clean, maybe even a bit disingenuous to the dark tone of the film preceding it. But, I guess the film is both about the dark AND the light... Honestly, you could’ve fooled me, because the dark side was much more interesting.
Why?: A question that is (fairly) levied at a lot of Lynch's films. I think out of all his movies that deal with sex and violence, this one is the least eloquent. Twin Peaks did it a lot better because it left 99% of it off the screen (and gave more agency to its victim). As for the other themes, a lot of them were surprisingly developed for such a new filmmaker. Lynch thoroughy explores taboo in a way you won't find anywhere else. Through all his work, this will never change.