Review of Blue Velvet (1986) by Devon B — 15 Aug 2011

A dandy fop pimp (Dean Stockwell) lip syncs Roy Orbison's "In Dreams" while a psychotic kidnapper (Dennis Hopper) stands listening, racked with emotion. That kind of scene may be standard fair for filmmaker David Lynch, but Blue Velvet is actually a more of a straight ahead ode to 1950s film noir than anything. The film begins in an idyllic small town setting but right from the beginning, there's a sense that not all is wholesome and family values here. On the way to the hospital to visit his father, Jeffrey (Kyle MacLachlan) finds a human ear lying in the woods. He takes it to the police and discovers some business about a missing person and a singer at a local nightclub. With the police detective's teenage daughter (Laura Dern) tagging along, Jeffrey launches his own personal investigation of the singer (Isabella Rossellini). What he discovers is a world of sex and violence centering around the sadomasochistic hophead Frank Booth (Hopper).

David Lynch likes to paint with broad strokes when he makes movies. Sometimes it seems like we're looking through the lense of some alien studying our planet. But Lynch isn't as inaccessible or weird as you might think, in fact films like Blue Velvet follow a pretty standard narrative. I like his unique perspective, both in the style of his films and the way in which he directs his actors. Blue Velvet has an aura of sleaze about it which is exactly the film it was meant to be. The film itself is quite superb.