Blue Velvet Review

        After the failure that was Dune, it was a miracle that David Lynch managed to bounce back with his next feature. While his obligation to make another supposed sequel to the book was canned, he still had one feature left with producer Dino De Laurentiis. And you’d believe that he finally received total control over the project. A far cry when the prior movie was taken away from him during the production process. David Lynch’s fourth film Blue Velvet is often considered his best work overall and the one where it laid the groundwork for his rebound. 

1. The Severed Ear 

        If there’s one thing to take away from the opening minutes is that the film is vibrant. We see the clear blue skies, white fences and roses blooming in what appears to be a representation of post-war America. All that though is a front for the muck that lays underneath the grass. I love how the montage is like a sense of normalcy until we see a poor man suffer a heart attack. Then zoom in inside the lawn to see various insects amid the dirt. 

        Kyle Machlachan comes back in the film and this is probably his best character role that he portrays so far. Starring as Jeffrey who comes back from school to visit his parents and to help run his father’s business. As he’s walking around his neighborhood, he stumbles upon a severed ear which prompts him to get the police involved. Little does he know, he’ll be caught in a conspiracy involving a lounge singer. While I’ll elaborate on Jeffrey’s arc in the next tab, this is probably the only normal David Lynch film I’ve seen so far. 

        What I mean by that is that we get a sense of normalcy during daylight. Everything is sort of like a clash between the 80s and the 50s. Like the year that it takes place isn’t important, but it’s perhaps supposed to be an idealistic realm of what is supposed to be a normal town in the country. And I feel that’s what the town of Lumberton is to be signifying. Everything is normal until the sun goes down then it’s a new animal. 

        Watching the movie, it reminded me a lot of the classic film noir movies of the past. In case you forgot or don’t know what that means, it’s a type of movie where there’s a detective involved and of course a beautiful woman that’s either in on the crime or partly responsible of it. With how Blue Velvet handles it, I feel that this film is mostly along the lines of neo-noir. Still retaining the elements but of course in color and is contemporary with the time it’s taking place. I mean it’s very vibrant in some instances, but it’s a façade. 

        As for David Lynch’s motifs, I feel that his moments or “Lynchian” moments aren’t too artsy or abstract in a sense where you have no clue what’s going on. This movie isn’t an art film in the least but a very straightforward movie where you can understand what’s happening. The only abstract moments that appear is when we see a candlelight being flickered or snuffed. Perhaps to symbolize Jeffrey getting into something or something. 

2. Jeffrey 

        MacLachlan’s role as Jeffrey is a complete 180 in comparison to his portrayal of Paul Atreides. He is what you call an active protagonist in the film. Where his own action and curiosity get the story rolling and not the other way around. And I feel that it’s a better way to have this story being told when he gets interested about the ear that he finds. Just his approach gets his wonder growth as he’s told by the local detective that it’s a continuing case on one of the criminals. More so, he befriends the detective’s daughter Sally. 

        This is Laura Dern’s first Lynch movie and she would become another regular to the director in the next film. One would assume that she would be the femme fatale in the story, she appears from the dark when meeting Jeffrey for the first time. She’s innocent and is aware of the investigation that is taking place. So much so that she helps Jeffrey with his endeavor to figure out the mystery and I like her character since I think she’s supposed to be his anchor when he tries to delve deep into danger. 

        The real femme fatale in the feature is when we finally see the lounge singer Dorothy Vallens. She sings the song that happens to be the title of the movie and is also part of the conspiracy. I love how the introduction to her is played out when we follow Jeffrey. Since he wants to do his own investigation, we see how he sneaks into her apartment and it gets the better of him when she finds him. One would think that she’d be the killer but is only been abused by the actual bad guy in this story. 

        It's crazy to think that this movie was the comeback for actor Dennis Hopper. My first exposure to him was when he portrayed the villain in the Keanu Reeves film Speed. And it turns out that a good chunk of his career was that he got typecasted as the mentally disturbed/villain in some instances. Hopper portrays Frank as the main criminal who abuses Dorothy and is the head of the conspiracy involving the ear. He seems kind of hokey with his performance, but he can easily switch from being that to serious. 

        Any moment involving him must include the breathing mask that is pumping in some stimulant to his mouth. Initially, Lynch decided to use Helium as the gas for Frank to breathe in. I couldn’t imagine seeing and hearing Frank’s voice being squeakier maybe would have brought the film to a hilarious halt. Apparently, it was Dennis Hopper who convinced him to change that gas to an unknown stimulant but I think it works since I wouldn’t take Frank’s character seriously if he sounded like a deranged chipmunk when he appears. I’ll credit Hopper for putting more thought into the character since he was an experienced drug abuser. 

3. Legacy

        Like anything Lynch has made at that time, there was a divide between the critics who couldn’t unanimously agree on what they saw. Some praised the movie as a return to form and for Lynch’s subtext about the seemingly normal American life. The other half disliked the film due to the graphic nature of it, when it’s probably the most tame of how it handled any abuse at the time. As time passed, there’s been a better appreciation for the film and to many claiming or dubbing it as one of Lynch’s best. 

I feel that with the story involving the mystery would inevitably lay the foundation of Lynch’s subsequent work. Just after his next feature, Lynch would go into the television route when he would develop the show Twin Peaks for ABC. That one would inevitably star Kyle MacLachlan as the main detective. The show did become a hit and has a spinoff that David Lynch directed that became the prelude to the series. 

4. Overall

        Blue Velvet is one of David Lynch’s best and one of the best films of the 80s.