Muholland Dr - Still Don't Get It (Spoiler)
Goldfinger
seen the movie. Well, I did yesterday and may I say, what a piece of
MASTERPIECE. I was so excited that I told all my colleagues this morning
and none of them has seen it (expectantly) or even heard of it (somewhat
disappointed). Anyway, here's my answers to the 10 clues on the back of the
insert, some I got and some I didn't get.
1. Two clues in the beginning of the film. I got the pillow which means
it's a dream, what's the other one?
2. Appearances of the red lampshade, didn't get this one.
3. Title of the film - Slyvia North Story. Kind of a weird movie title and
I didn't get it last night. But I woke up this morning and bingo,
Sylvia(Diane Sylven) North (Canada), this is the story of Diane! I'm too
smart!
4. Location of the accident - Muholland Dr, don't know if there's anything
to it?
5. Who gives a key and why? The hit man. Why? It's the key to the blue
box and I think the blue box symbolise Diane's entire empty life.
6. Robe, ashtray and the coffee cup. Not sure, these are objects in the
real part of the movie that recur in the dream part. I think it's something
to do with projection or sub-consciousneness.
7. Sliencio? Life is a dream, nothing is real in Hollywood
8. Did talent alone help Camilla? No, which is why Diane dreams of the
fantastic audition scenes. She thinks Camilla gets to the top with her look
and body but she (Diane) is still the more talented one.
9. Occurrences surrounding the man behind Winkie's? Didn't get this one
10. Where's Aunt Ruth? She's dead.
madkevin
"Goldfinger" <goldfin...@home.com> wrote in message
news:KoAx8.593541$eM1....@news.easynews.com...
> I have been holding off reading the Muholland Dr threads because I haven't
> seen the movie. Well, I did yesterday and may I say, what a piece of
> MASTERPIECE. I was so excited that I told all my colleagues this morning
> and none of them has seen it (expectantly) or even heard of it (somewhat
> disappointed). Anyway, here's my answers to the 10 clues on the back of the
> insert, some I got and some I didn't get.
I wouldn't worry too much about those "clues" if I were you, as most of them seemed
purposefully obtuse. The big super clue is the POV of the head falling into the
pillow, which pretty clearly illustrates (to me, at any rate) that the first part of
the movie is a dream. All else follows pretty clearly from that point.
Look below in another Mulholland Dr. related thread for a link to the Salon article
"Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Mulholland Dr", which is like the crib
notes for the movie.
Kevin "Mmmm... Naomi Watts" Cogliano
ApplesOran
it's a dream, what's the other one?>>
That Diane wins the jitterbug contest and that either the old couple were
physically the ones who presented her with the award, or are a representation
of the potential she once had (which explains their haunting later on)
<<2. Appearances of the red lampshade, didn't get this one.>>
The pan down to the red lampshade and phone is shown right after the sequence
of mysterious phone calls by unnamed people and before Betty's exit from LAX.
The same shot is re-used at the end of MD when Diane gets the call from Camilla
to go to the infamous party (where everything falls apart for Diane, and where
- Wizard Of Oz-style - many, if not all the players in Diane's fever dream are
in attendence).
You can interpret the lampshade shot many ways. My view is that Diane kept her
"secret" and dark side out of view (behind Winkies) and the purpose of the
movie/dream is that realization coming to the surface for Diane. The
mysterious calls were the beginning of the truth trying to find Diane (or
vice-versa since she is dreaming this).
<<4. Location of the accident - Muholland Dr, don't know if there's anything
to it?>>
It's the location of the party, when Diane totally falls apart and incorporates
the guests into her paranoid dream - are they all conspiring against her? Are
they sincere? The truth is, of course, that Diane is the only one to blame for
her eventual murderous actions and no amount of self-defensive delusion can
shake that.
<<6. Robe, ashtray and the coffee cup>>
Well, I'll only mention that the coffee cup looks a lot like the Winkies'
coffee cup where the deal for the "hit" was made.
<<7. Sliencio? Life is a dream, nothing is real in Hollywood>>
What you have before you is an illusion - as real as it may seem. I think this
was hitting the nail on the head, but it's a great scene!
<<9. Occurrences surrounding the man behind Winkie's? Didn't get this one>>
Interesting to note that he man behind Winkies was played by a woman. See my
comment in #2 above.
Cheers,
Flexx
Visit The CineFlexx
http://members.aol.com/beautymarkstudio/Home.html
Kevin Schonhaut
branches) which also appeared above the fireplace in the aunt's condo.
However, there was no aunt's condo, was there?
"Goldfinger" <goldfin...@home.com> wrote in message
news:KoAx8.593541$eM1....@news.easynews.com...
John Harkness
I think the "clues" are a bit of a joke.
I also don't think that "getting it" is of paramount importance with
Mulholland Drive. It's not The Usual Suspects or The Sixth Sense --
it's a movie where you want to sink into the sheer voluptuous mood of
the thing than sit around trying to parse the plot.
John Harkness
blu...@megsinet.cutcaps.net
> Anyway, here's my answers to the 10 clues on the
> back of the insert, some I got and some I didn't get.
>
Goldfinger,
I agree with some of your conclusions. Given you bring up Lynch's
ten clues on the DVD insert, I think I'll take a stab at them too:
(1) "Pay particular attention in the beginning of the film : at least
two clues are revealed before the credits."
I can't say for sure how Lynch sees the structure of the film in
his mind, but here's my take: The two scenes before the credits-- the
jitterbug contest and the movement to the pillow-- both are struck from
the same mold as the scenes at the film's end. These are the reality
scenes-- more precisely, reality with a twist. In the final section of
the film, Diane fades in and out of three mind sets: Stark reality,
flashbacks to real events, and hallucinations that blend reality with
Diane's obviously warped fantasies.
As I see it, when the movie opens, we are in Diane's apartment in
the final hours of her life. She is about to start dreaming. She will
kill herself shortly after waking. The jitterbug contest we see was
based on the real event that Diane later says inspired her to become an
actress. In other words, it is based on the reality of the final
section of the movie rather than the shuffled reality of the dream
section. Clearly this is not a flashback, but rather a hallucination.
In a hyper surge, she recalls winning the contest (but visualizes it
with psychedelic imagery) as she basks in the spotlight with an
important (to her) old couple. Maybe they are her parents. Maybe they
are the judges of the contest. One thing they clearly are NOT is a
couple she just met on an airplane (as the dream recasts them). Whoever
they are, she sees them as the ones who were there at her first step
toward stardom. As when they shared that one moment of success with
her, they return later (in another hallucination) to push her over the
edge when all hopes of success are gone.
The snap transitions between manic hallucinations and depressing
reality we see in the final section of the movie are previewed in the
opener as the contest vision crumbles into the stark reality of her
apartment. I love the way Lynch sets apart the reality segments of the
movie. Diane has obviously been holed up there for days, perhaps weeks.
Outside light is sealed off. Everything is silent except for perhaps
her breathing. There's almost a musty scent to the air as we look
around the darkened room. Then the point-of-view takes us to the pillow
and to the dream. The two clues? The jitterbug contest is connected to
the reality section at the film's end and the pillow indicates the
beginning of the dream. Everything before the pillow fade-out is not
part of the dream, but rather part of her confused state of reality.
(2) "Notice appearances of the red lampshade."
Diane's dream starts out the way she subconsciously wants Hollywood
to be. She's now the talented, charming, and always helpful Betty. Her
former lover is not dead from the paid hit and is now the loving and
dependent Rita. Her aunt is not dead but rather going on a trip.
Meanwhile, bad things are happening to her real-life rival Adam. As the
dream goes on, however, reality slowly creeps in on this lovely
dreamscape. One of the earliest examples of this is the "Girl is
missing" section. Here the phone calls about the botched limo hit
eventually end with an unanswered phone on the table with the red
lampshaded light in Diane's apartment. The real Diane, who is not the
ultra-sweetie Betty, begins here to blend into the dream. Eventually,
Betty will find her own bloated, long-dead body in that apartment
(probably an indication that she has been mulling over the possibility
of suicide long before she ultimately does pull the trigger for real).
Later, by the way, in the reality section, Diane answers the same phone
by the same lamp.
(3) "Can you hear the title of the film that Adam Kesher is auditioning
actresses for?"
Yes-- "The Sylvia North Story".
"Is it mentioned again?"
Yes-- in the reality section, during the party conversation. The
key thing to notice is that this movie exists in both the dream and
reality. However, the circumstances are quite different: Adam is the
director of this movie in the dream (making him the hapless recipient of
Hollywood's brutal side). In reality, the director is Bob Brooker, the
stupid director in her dream at her audition (notice there he was the
only one who couldn't recognize her obvious talent). Camilla Rhodes is
the movie's star in the dream. This Camilla, however, is the unnamed
woman who kisses the real Camilla at the party. This dream Camilla is
also pushed onto the director by little Mr. Roque and the Castigliane
Brothers ("this is the girl"). A similar headshot photo of the real
Camilla is passed to the hit man by Diane with the same "this is the
girl" statement. These are all examples of how things from Diane's real
life are reshuffled and twisted in her dream.
(4) "An accident is a terrible event . . . notice the location of the
accident."
The accident happens at the same spot where Camilla leads Diane to
the fateful party. Lynch points out that an accident is a terrible
event. The same can be said of that party. As ApplesOran mentioned in
another note here, there is a "Wizard Of Oz" sort of transformation of
the characters between the dream and reality sequences. This is
particularly true of the party. Lynch is pointing here to pay close
attention to every detail of this party. A momentary glimpse at the
party (e.g. the exiting man in a cowboy hat) can lead to a major player
in the dream (the Cowboy).
(5) "Who gives a key and why?"
The key is given by the hit man. He is going to leave it on
Diane's table as a signal that he has killed Camilla. In the dream,
again a part of reality slowly creeping in, the hit man's payoff cash
and a stylized version of the key are both found in Rita's purse. That
key is the first step toward unlocking the blue box we later see. When
the blue box is opened, the dream is over. I take this to mean the blue
box is the horrible reality Diane is trying to dream away.
(6) "Notice the robe, the ashtray, the coffee cup."
These three items instantly change when Diane sees Camilla on the
sofa.
The piano-shaped ashtray was reclaimed by the neighbor in the real
section of the movie. Moments later, as Diane and Camilla are topless
on the sofa, the ashtray is back on the table. The robe Diane had on is
gone, replaced by cutoff shorts. The coffee cup she held becomes a
drink in a glass. Lynch is making sure we know here that this is not a
hallucination but rather a flashback. This is an earlier but recent
time, when the ashtray was still there and Diane looks much less
world-weary. Distinguishing this scene from a hallucination is
important because Camilla's rejection of Diane really happened. This
set off the cycle of madness that ultimately doomed them both.
(7) "What is felt, realized, and gathered at the club Silencio?"
At the Club Silencio, the reality of Diane's life all but crashes
into her escapist dream as Betty. Notice her shudders as the emcee
onstage says "this is all an illusion". Her escape is not valid. And
though she can hold Camilla/Rita in her dreams, the facts of their
situation are spelled out in the words of the song "Crying" that Rebekah
del Rio sings to them in Spanish-- especially this final verse:
I thought that I was over you
But it's true, oo so true
I love you even more
Than I did before
But darling what can I do
For you don't love me and I'll always be
Crying over you, crying over you
Yes, now you're gone and from this moment on
I'll be crying
Here at Club Silencio, the final step back to reality is found in
Diane's purse: The blue box.
(8) "Did talent alone help Camilla?"
In actuality, probably. The man next to Diane at the party
immediately says how great Camilla was in "The Sylvia North Story" when
Diane mentions the film. And in reality, Camilla's boyfriend did not
direct the movie; Bob Brooker did. Thus, she didn't get credit (as far
as we know) for sleeping with the director. In Diane's eyes, however,
she deserved the part more than Camilla. Not surprisingly, the dream
version of Camilla only gets the job through evil backroom deals.
(9) "Note the occurrences surrounding the man behind Winkie's"
In the dream sequence, a man tells another man about his
nightmare. In it, he sees a monstrous man behind the Winkie's. The two
men then go out back to confront the fear. The sudden appearance then
of the "monster" knocks the man with the nightmare to the ground. We
later see that this man was at the counter at Winkie's when Diane made
her deal with the hit man. We also see that the monster is actually
just a homeless man in reality, someone transformed into something else
by the dream (like so many others). But wait! The homeless man is a
monster in her reality too. He is the one with the blue box now as her
flashback becomes a hallucination of the return of the old people. It's
as if this monster has been unleashed at the very site of Diane's
lowest, most evil deed-- the contract on Camilla's life. There's no
turning back. She has given up all hope for happiness and success.
From the box, the old couple return now taunting and laughing. The
people there with her at her greatest success are now there in her mind
to drive her completely mad. After she kills herself, the first thing
we see again is the monster-- the embodiment of her greatest sin and
ultimate downfall. However, we also then see Diane and Camille together
again.
(10) "Where's Aunt Ruth?"
At the party, Diane says she is dead. This is one of the first
clues (of many at the party) indicating the "reality" of the earlier
scenes of the movie (in which Aunt Ruth was alive) have actually been
altered and reshuffled from real people who are Diane's relatives,
friends, lovers, acquaintances, or even people she momentarily glances
at.
Jay
4/25/02
http://members.core.com/~bluejay/
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WinningerR
think it's *all* a dream, though some bits of it are closer to reality than
others.
The events at that final party, for instance, are way too melodramatic to be
accepted as real. They're the sort of things a jealous lover imagines.
(Not to mention the little homonculi that crawl under the door to torment
Betty/Diane).
blu...@megsinet.cutcaps.net
> Personally, I reject the idea that *anything* in the
> movie depicts reality. I think it's *all* a dream, though
> some bits of it are closer to reality than others.
WinningerR,
Really? A dream with two separate imagined realities, each with
its own roster of characters? Do you reject any meaning to the
"bookends" of the pillow scene and the "hey pretty girl, time to wake
up" scene? I'm not saying you're wrong; I'm just curious what you make
of this.
>
> The events at that final party, for instance, are way
> too melodramatic to be accepted as real. They're
> the sort of things a jealous lover imagines.
Three things about the party: (1) It is a Hollywood party full of
self-important "players". Diane is clearly a failed bit-part actress at
best. I'm not too shocked that she would be treated as a mild curiosity
at best or an object of scorn at worst. (2) I don't think the real
Camilla was anywhere near as nice as Rita was in the dream (notice her
personality change). While it wouldn't shock me that small-town Diane
has not had a lesbian fling before this, Camilla seems to have a history
with the unnamed woman she kisses at the party (the one who becomes
Camilla in the dream). In other words, Camilla finds her relationship
with Diane far less special than Diane does. Meanwhile, Camilla strikes
me as someone hell-bent on success. When director Adam becomes single
again (announcing that his favorable divorce judgment earned him the
pool and his wife the pool man), there's no shock that Camilla swoops in
while simultaneously going out of her way to convince Diane it's over.
(3) The party is a flashback playing out in Diane's clearly warped mind.
It's not shocking that she would remember the facts a bit
melodramatically and from a self-centered perspective. It's a lot
easier for me to see the party as a biased perspective played out in
Diane's memory rather than part of a second dreamscape.
>
> (Not to mention the little homonculi that crawl under
> the door to torment Betty/Diane).
I see the tiny version of the old people as hallucinations Diane
genuinely sees (in reality, however, only she would see them). She also
hallucinates Camilla has returned from the dead in the kitchen and she
hallucinates about the jitterbug contest in almost acid-trip terms. The
changing perspectives she has within her manic/depressive head during
the reality sections do not negate for me the overriding notion that
this is the reality she reinvents in her dream.
One thing I'll bet, however-- Lynch loves it when different people
come to different conclusions on his work.
CharlesMcBarron
Certainly, it's possible that it's all a dream. Who says we have to "get it"?
Who says there is only one answer?
Lynch isn't saying anything.
Terrific movie, IMO, and like most interesting works of art, it is open to
interpretation.
kentrel
>
> I have been holding off reading the Muholland Dr threads because I haven't
> seen the movie. Well, I did yesterday and may I say, what a piece of
> MASTERPIECE. I was so excited that I told all my colleagues this morning
> and none of them has seen it (expectantly) or even heard of it (somewhat
> disappointed). Anyway, here's my answers to the 10 clues on the back of the
> insert, some I got and some I didn't get.
Calling Mulholland Dr. a "Masterpiece" is going a bit far. An
interesting piece of video art, but nothing else.
Also, those "clues" are just a marketing ploy to make people go back and
watch it a second time. This isn't the "Sixth Sense" or "Fight Club"
where a fabulous twist is subtly set up during the movie. Lynch puts
these "clues" in his movies to make them seem clever and thoughtful,
when they are clearer neither. Mulholland Dr. was originally a pilot for
a tv show (you can read the script at www.simplyscripts.com) and the
major "twist" at the end of the movie was never even conceived when they
filmed the pilot. To convert it to a movie Lynch just filmed extra
footage, reedited, and inserted random scenes which Lynch's fans claim
to be those ever elusive "clues".
Ultimately Mulholland Dr cheats its audience because those who were
paying attention (and I was) were looking for these clues. And we saw
them. They weren't hard to spot. However, the end of the movie doesn't
pay off. No matter which way you see the movie there are elements which
contradict that. The most popular "masturbatory dream" theory doesn't
fit due to other scenes which conflict with that theory's "evidence".
A movie is anything which tells a story. There must be a beginning a
middle and an end. No matter how bizarre or how bad the movie, it must
tell some kind of story, and it must have those three elements. Even
"Memento" which tells a story "backwards" has the same basic Three Act
structure most movies have.
If it doesn't have that then it doesn't qualify as a movie. Mulholland
Dr doesn't tell a story. It's video art. Just another one of Lynch's
exploration of dreams, and as we all know dreams are just random
nonsense.
- kentrel
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------
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I wanted a mission, and for my sins they gave me one. "
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JoeS
> A movie is anything which tells a story. There must be a beginning a
> middle and an end. No matter how bizarre or how bad the movie, it must
> tell some kind of story, and it must have those three elements. Even
> "Memento" which tells a story "backwards" has the same basic Three Act
> structure most movies have.
>
> If it doesn't have that then it doesn't qualify as a movie. Mulholland
> Dr doesn't tell a story. It's video art. Just another one of Lynch's
> exploration of dreams, and as we all know dreams are just random
> nonsense.
How sad for you.
What an extremely limited view of what "a movie" may be!
That you believe dreams are random nonsense is revealing of your flawed
perspective.
Joe
madkevin
"kentrel" <ken...@mailandnews.com> wrote in message
news:3CC83100...@mailandnews.com...
> Calling Mulholland Dr. a "Masterpiece" is going a bit far. An
> interesting piece of video art, but nothing else.
As strange as it is to find myself defending David Lynch, "Mulholland Dr." is
certainly much more than a piece of "video art". (Although, to be fair, I'm not
entirely clear what you mean by that phrase.) While the term "masterpiece" gets
thrown around too often for my taste, "Mulholland Dr." is definitely the most
satisfying Lynch movie since "Blue Velvet", and perhaps ever. Time will tell if it
deserves the appellation of "masterpiece".
> Also, those "clues" are just a marketing ploy to make people go back and
> watch it a second time. This isn't the "Sixth Sense" or "Fight Club"
> where a fabulous twist is subtly set up during the movie. Lynch puts
> these "clues" in his movies to make them seem clever and thoughtful,
> when they are clearer neither. Mulholland Dr. was originally a pilot for
> a tv show (you can read the script at www.simplyscripts.com) and the
> major "twist" at the end of the movie was never even conceived when they
> filmed the pilot. To convert it to a movie Lynch just filmed extra
> footage, reedited, and inserted random scenes which Lynch's fans claim
> to be those ever elusive "clues".
While I agree that the clues are unnessesary to understand "Mulholland Dr.", I think
you're devaluing Lynch's achievement here. Obviously, the original conception of the
television show was different. I imagine that eventually the disparate threads of the
story would coalesce into something substantial. (Maybe not - it is Lynch, after
all.) But it is clear that the first two hours point to the beginnings of what could
have been a very interesting television show.
That show will never happen, sadly. Instead, Lynch looked at the matierial and
reimagined the relationships of the characters, pinning an extrodinary ending that
doesn't explain the previous two hours so much as illuminate it. Lynch goes far
beyond a mere "twist", a la "Sixth Sense" - he gives the story an entirely new
psychological dimension. It is, in my opinion, a breathtaking achievement.
> Ultimately Mulholland Dr cheats its audience because those who were
> paying attention (and I was) were looking for these clues. And we saw
> them. They weren't hard to spot. However, the end of the movie doesn't
> pay off. No matter which way you see the movie there are elements which
> contradict that. The most popular "masturbatory dream" theory doesn't
> fit due to other scenes which conflict with that theory's "evidence".
I believe it is a mistake to assume that the meaning of this film can correspond to a
perfect explanation. Lynch's films have always had the texture of the inexplicable.
The ending of the film does, in my opinion, tie things up quite well, but not
perfectly. There is still room for interpretation.
To his credit, Lynch has created a film experience that is different for each person
who views it. (The polar opposite of conventional Hollywood film-making, by which
film-makers seemingly strive to give each viewer the exact same experience, with no
room for ambiguity.) Our difference of opinion is simply that you seem to feel that
the ambiguities outweigh the merits. Which is, coincidentally, how I feel about most
of his other films.
> A movie is anything which tells a story. There must be a beginning a
> middle and an end. No matter how bizarre or how bad the movie, it must
> tell some kind of story, and it must have those three elements. Even
> "Memento" which tells a story "backwards" has the same basic Three Act
> structure most movies have.
>
> If it doesn't have that then it doesn't qualify as a movie. Mulholland
> Dr doesn't tell a story. It's video art. Just another one of Lynch's
> exploration of dreams, and as we all know dreams are just random
> nonsense.
I would have to take issue with that definition of "movie". A movie is any collection
of photographed images shown sequentially at a certain speed fast enough to mimic
movement. (Even that is reductive: what of Jarman's "Blue"?) A movie doesn't have to
have narrative, a movie does not have to have a beginning, middle and end. Is
Jarman's "Last Of England" a movie? Is Greenaway's "The Falls" a movie? Is "I Am
Cuba" a movie?
More importantly, by your description, "Mulholland Dr." clearly qualifies. It has a
beginning, middle and an end. It tells a story: girl comes to Hollywood, girl's
dreams of being a successful actress are squashed, girl takes revenge on a lover who
has rejected her, girl kills herself. That's a story.
Kevin "Empire State" Cogliano
kentrel
> How sad for you.
>
> What an extremely limited view of what "a movie" may be!
That's not a limited view of what a movie is, that's just exactly what a
movie is by its very definition. The definition may be limited, but not
my view. Movies tell stories - that's their sole purpose. They may also
entertain, or educate or enlighten, but the purpose they *must* fulfill
is to tell a story. Anyone working in the movie industry will tell you
that, in fact, one just has. Moviemaking is an extension of
storytelling. That's a simple fact. If it doesn't tell a story then its
video art.
> That you believe dreams are random nonsense is revealing of your flawed
> perspective.
You can't prove otherwise. Two scientists, Hobson and McCarley found
that dream activity in cats begins after random firings in the brain
stem. They found that the sleepy brain gets stimulated by these random
firings and tries to make sense out of them and the memories that are
initiated. They found that that the neural networks that the mind loads
during the day get saturated with information and create false links
between neural nets that produce what we see as bizzare dreams. The
random firing cleans these out during the night.
This makes sense because memories are created as collection of sensory
inputs. For example, you might remember an event from both the sight,
and the sound of it. This is why blind people can't dream in pictures,
or deaf people can hear sounds in their dreams. Dreams are just
collections of random sensory images processed by the unconscious while
the rest of the brain performs its nightly recovery operation.
So, dreams are just random nonsense. You know that, everybody knows
that. However nobody remembers the nonsensical dreams, they only
remember the ones which seem to say something about their current life.
Since you can have half a dozen dreams a night one of those dreams are
bound to pop up at some time or other.
I always laugh when I hear people talk about a particular dream they've
had where they are running away\towards something and no matter how hard
they try to run in the dream they just can't budge. Everybody's had this
dream. I've had it, but most people try to work out the significance of
it. I once listened to a radio talk show where a caller mentioned this.
For the next hour people rang in with similar stories and they all had
their own take of what it signified.
The truth?
Those dreams are similar to sleepwalking, only in this case just your
legs are moving. The reason you can't run, your legs are kicking in the
air but the bedsheets are getting in the way. Researchers have
demonstrated this. I once had a dream which disturbed me. I dreamt I had
been killed by gangsters which looked like Gabriel Byrne, Kevin Space
and Roberto Del Tormo (sp?), and for the duration of the dream I was in
a policestation watching a police lineup. My frustration in the dream
was that I was shouting at the cops that I knew who it was but they just
wouldn't listen to me. This dream had been very vivid and I woke in a
sweat wondering if there was any signifance to it. I then realised that
I was staying in a friends spare room and he had the famous Usual
Suspects poster up right beside the bed. You can dream with your eyes
open you know. And thats exactly what I did.
Now I don't know what the purpose of your post was. Maybe it was to
satisfy yourself, to joke, or to insult. But it certainly wasn't to
inform. I'm afraid this post ran for much longer than I meant it to, and
I doubt you had the attention span to read it all, but if you or anyone
else did at least you've learned something today.
You see, I know what I'm talking about. You just think you do.
kentrel
>
> "kentrel" <ken...@mailandnews.com> wrote in message
> news:3CC83100...@mailandnews.com...
>
> > Calling Mulholland Dr. a "Masterpiece" is going a bit far. An
> > interesting piece of video art, but nothing else.
>
> As strange as it is to find myself defending David Lynch, "Mulholland Dr." is
> certainly much more than a piece of "video art". (Although, to be fair, I'm not
> entirely clear what you mean by that phrase.) While the term "masterpiece" gets
> thrown around too often for my taste, "Mulholland Dr." is definitely the most
> satisfying Lynch movie since "Blue Velvet", and perhaps ever. Time will tell if it
> deserves the appellation of "masterpiece".
No disrespect to Lynch fans and by your post you are obviously an
intelligent fan so I don't wish to offend you, but I very much doubt it
will ever deserve to be called a "masterpiece". The reason? It doesn't
say anything except that dreams are weird. And we all know that. If
movies were paintings Mullholland Dr would be modern art, and everything
else popular Renaissance with the occasional Da Vinci (Kubrick) cropping
up. I suppose its simply a matter of taste but I just don't like modern
art. I applaud Lynch for daring to be different. Very few directors
these days deserve the same. However, I like my movies to tell a story.
You do make the argument that Mulholland Dr. does have a story, namely
about the girl coming to Hollywood, and then her eventual death. You can
make that argument, but what about the random scenes thrown in, and
the difference in her character at the start and the end. Those
differences seem to suggest she's dreaming a fantastical story, and the
random scenes Lynch's experimentation with dreams. i.e. dreams are often
broken with random scenes that don't make sense. If you ignored those
aspects of Mulholland Dr, yes you would be left with a story, but also,
ignoring it removes most of the film. To me, that just doesn't qualify
as a story.
> While I agree that the clues are unnessesary to understand "Mulholland Dr.", I think
> you're devaluing Lynch's achievement here. Obviously, the original conception of the
> television show was different. I imagine that eventually the disparate threads of the
> story would coalesce into something substantial. (Maybe not - it is Lynch, after
> all.) But it is clear that the first two hours point to the beginnings of what could
> have been a very interesting television show.
I don't wish to devalue Lynch's achievement. I have respect for him. He
took a tv show that no network wanted and turned it into a movie that
pleased a lot of people. A pretty amazing feat. He deserves respect, but
in the same way in that a guy who escapes from prison by disguising
himself as a prison guard, has a couple of close calls at the gate but
eventually makes it out. Not that I'm comparing Lynch to a prisoner but
I just think that his success has come more from expertly pulling the
wool over people's eyes when all the odds were against him, than from
making a good movie.
If Joe Average had made The Godfather or 2001 I think you'd agree that
people would have been bestowing praise on him like they were Coppola
and Kubrick (though those films did have their detractors, but not
many).
Though, if Joe Average had made this movie instead (and btw, this movie
only got made because it was Lynch) would you have still liked it? Would
it have even gotten a distributor. Would people be bestowing praise on
it? I think they would just be saying "This makes no sense. What a load
of nonsense".
But because its Lynch people are calling it a "masterpiece". It's a film
version of modern art. If you or I threw some paint on a canvas and
called it "Interpretation of Dreams" or something and tried to sell it
at an art gallery we'd be told to get lost. However, if a famous modern
artist (sorry, don't know any famous modern artists :)) painted it, it
would sell for thousands\millions and be called a masterpiece.
These are just my opinions on Mulholland Dr, and I respect the
intelligent argument you made defending Lynch, but it won't make me ever
respect him as a movie making talent, just look at Dune. :)
regards
kentrel
> aspects of Mulholland Dr, yes you would be left with a story, but also,
> ignoring it removes most of the film. To me, that just doesn't qualify
> as a story.
I should read my posts before I send them. That should read "To me, that
just doesn't qualify as a story, if you have to remove the film in order
to tell it"
Sorry about that.
JoeS
> You see, I know what I'm talking about. You just think you do.
The extreme irony is that you only think you know what you are talking about.
There is no definition of "a movie" as "the telling of a story in 3-act
form".
As to the dream *theory* to which you referred, it may account for some forms
of dreaming, but certainly does not account for all. You take a bit of
research much too far, counter to actual experience. You must have en
extremely interesting notion of the meaning of "random nonsense".
Joe
madkevin
> madkevin wrote:
> No disrespect to Lynch fans and by your post you are obviously an
> intelligent fan so I don't wish to offend you, but I very much doubt it
> will ever deserve to be called a "masterpiece". The reason? It doesn't
> say anything except that dreams are weird. And we all know that. If
> movies were paintings Mullholland Dr would be modern art, and everything
> else popular Renaissance with the occasional Da Vinci (Kubrick) cropping
> up. I suppose its simply a matter of taste but I just don't like modern
> art. I applaud Lynch for daring to be different. Very few directors
> these days deserve the same. However, I like my movies to tell a story.
No disrespect taken. Believe it or not, there are some people on Usenet who actually
enjoy a good discussion.
The main bone of contention here is that I believe that "Mulholland" does in fact say
more than simply "dreams are weird". By recasting the first two hours as a dream
state, I believe that Lynch is able to go very deeply within the psyche of Diane's
character to reveal things that most movies wouldn't dare, and most people wouldn't
dare discuss.
Diane's fantasy life speaks volumes about her character, but even more impressively
speaks volumes about the dichotomy of Hollywood as an idealized dreamworld versus the
seedy reality. "Mulholland Dr." is a movie about movies as much as it is a movie
about dreams.
> You do make the argument that Mulholland Dr. does have a story, namely
> about the girl coming to Hollywood, and then her eventual death. You can
> make that argument, but what about the random scenes thrown in, and
> the difference in her character at the start and the end. Those
> differences seem to suggest she's dreaming a fantastical story, and the
> random scenes Lynch's experimentation with dreams. i.e. dreams are often
> broken with random scenes that don't make sense. If you ignored those
> aspects of Mulholland Dr, yes you would be left with a story, but also,
> ignoring it removes most of the film. To me, that just doesn't qualify
> as a story.
Again, the central disagreement here is that I don't nessesarily have to throw out
those fantastical or random elements to have a story. Let's take, for example, the
most surreal element of the film, Club Silencio. Aside from the usual Lynchian
fascinations with red drapery, the Club reveals a pivotal moment in understanding
Diane's character: as the chanteuse on the stage lip-syncs to a Spanish version of
Roy Orbinson's "Crying", Diane comes to the shattering realization that this fantasy
world she has created is not real, and she shakes uncontrollably. The seeming
surrealistic elements are grounded in a perfectly understandable psychological
reality - a first for Lynch, perhaps.
<snip>
> If Joe Average had made The Godfather or 2001 I think you'd agree that
> people would have been bestowing praise on him like they were Coppola
> and Kubrick (though those films did have their detractors, but not
> many).
>
> Though, if Joe Average had made this movie instead (and btw, this movie
> only got made because it was Lynch) would you have still liked it? Would
> it have even gotten a distributor. Would people be bestowing praise on
> it? I think they would just be saying "This makes no sense. What a load
> of nonsense".
Actually, quite the opposite. I was fully prepared to hate "Mulholland Dr." as much
as I utterly despise "Wild At Heart" or "Lost Highway". I am very far away from being
a fan of David Lynch, as most of his films are psuedo-intellectual twaddle
masqurading as art films. Believe me, nobody is more surprised about how much I liked
"Mullholland Dr." than I am.
To extend your line of thought, if an unknown made a interesting, off-beat film, you
state that I wouldn't like it as much as if it were made by a known director. Except
that I really liked "Donnie Darko", a first film by a director I had never heard of
previously. And, of course, "Memento", even though I had never seen Christopher
Nolan's first film.
In other words, I like to think that I'd recognize quality regardless of who's name
was on it.
<snip>
> These are just my opinions on Mulholland Dr, and I respect the
> intelligent argument you made defending Lynch, but it won't make me ever
> respect him as a movie making talent, just look at Dune. :)
Or "Eraserhead". There's a film I'd be quite happy to never ever have to sit through
again.
Kevin "Or Fire Walk With Me" Cogliano
Richard ©ç® ²ºº²
"kentrel" <ken...@mailandnews.com> wrote in message news:3CC84675...@mailandnews.com...
: However, I like my movies to tell a story.
:
===================
Your definition of "story" must be very limited......................
ApplesOran
storytelling. That's a simple fact. If it doesn't tell a story then its
video art. >>
Thank God wet have non-traditional alternatives to 3 act structures like 2001:
A Space Odyssey.
John Harkness
wrote:
>JoeS wrote:
>> How sad for you.
>>
>> What an extremely limited view of what "a movie" may be!
>
>That's not a limited view of what a movie is, that's just exactly what a
>movie is by its very definition. The definition may be limited, but not
>my view. Movies tell stories - that's their sole purpose. They may also
>entertain, or educate or enlighten, but the purpose they *must* fulfill
>is to tell a story. Anyone working in the movie industry will tell you
>that, in fact, one just has. Moviemaking is an extension of
>storytelling. That's a simple fact. If it doesn't tell a story then its
>video art.
>
There are more things in the movies, Horatio, than are in your
philosophy.
Asking people "in the film industry" to define movies is rather like
asking the guys who own Burger King to define food.
John Harkness
WinningerR
its own roster of characters? Do you reject any meaning to the
"bookends" of the pillow scene and the "hey pretty girl, time to wake
up" scene? I'm not saying you're wrong; I'm just curious what you make
of this.<<<
I'm not sure the imagined realties are so separate. I see them as a single
reality that ebbs and flows as it unfolds, just like a dream -- characters
change faces and/or names, symbols shift in meaning and appearance, etc.
In the beginning, Betty/Dianne constructs a sort of idealized world in her
dream, with only the occasional hint of a grimmer reality leaking through. She
is brave, her appreciative lover is dependent upon her, she wows Hollywood with
her talent, etc.
Things start to turn dark, though, when her Hollywood fantasy brings her onto a
movie set where she sees Adam, her romantic rival. His appearance sets off
alarm bells in her head, forcing her to flee. From that point on, the dream
starts to slowly transform into a nightmare.
Many of the events that most people accept as "real," seem like paranoid
fantasy to me. Adam's wife leaving him for the pool cleaner, for instance, or
the shadowy, criminal conspiracy that dictates casting choices to the Hollywood
studios. The former is such an absurd, fantasyland cliche that it seems likely
to me that Betty/Dianne invented it to explain Adam's divorce and sudden
availability to woo/marry "Rita." The latter is probably a rationalization for
Betty/Diane's own lack of success in Hollywood and an expression of her
delusion that a strange engine of Hollywood conspirators is largely responsible
for driving her and Rita apart.
I think the events of the final party are clearly exaggerated as well. Did Rita
and Adam really drag Betty all the way out to Mulholland Drive just to
maliciously humiliate her in public? Is Rita really so evil as to kiss that
other actress right in front of Betty's face just to hurt her? Or is all this
just the way Betty subconsciously remembers the event? Why doesn't anyone at
the party notice that Betty is crying her eyes out and make any attempt to
comfort her?
In fact, I think it's possible that Rita was never really romantically involved
w/Adam in the first place. Betty just imagined that they were in love (based on
that glimpse of Adam directing Rita and Rita seeming to enjoy it) and further
imagined that Adam was most responsible for taking Rita away from her.
I do believe, though, that the initial pillow shot is "real." Haven't made up
my mind about the "time to wake up" scene
WinningerR
these "clues" in his movies to make them seem clever and thoughtful,
when they are clearer neither.>>>
Personally, I find the "clues" clever and thoughtful but agree that there is no
single intended solution.
If the "clues" were flung out at random instead of carefully conceived it would
be much harder to put them together in all sorts of combinations to form
interesting and compelling insights into the film.
The fact that some of the material in the film was originally created for
another purpose seems wholly irrelevant to me.
Stephen Cooke
On 26 Apr 2002, WinningerR wrote:
> Many of the events that most people accept as "real," seem like paranoid
> fantasy to me. Adam's wife leaving him for the pool cleaner, for instance, or
> the shadowy, criminal conspiracy that dictates casting choices to the
> Hollywood studios.
o/~"Who holds back the electric car/Who made Steve Guttenberg a
star?..."o/~
swac
And if anybody can explain that spate of Craig Wasson films in the late
70s/early 80s, I'd love to know.
blu...@megsinet.cutcaps.net
> Personally, I find the "clues" clever and thoughtful
> but agree that there is no single intended solution.
>
I believe David Lynch has a definite view about the structure of
the movie and what is supposedly going on. However, I believe he built
in enough ambiguity to allow several alternate readings. Perhaps
neither of us are reading the movie the way he actually intended. The
fact, however, that so many people can watch the same movie and walk
away with personally-satisfying theories that are incompatible with each
other is, I suspect, a source of great satisfaction for Lynch.
> If the "clues" were flung out at random instead
> of carefully conceived it would be much harder to
> put them together in all sorts of combinations to form
> interesting and compelling insights into the film.
I agree.
>
> The fact that some of the material in the film was
> originally created for another purpose seems wholly
> irrelevant to me.
Absolutely. The history behind "Mulholland Dr." was well known by
most people who saw it. It was a pilot for a proposed TV-series that
was reworked into a movie. Given this pilot only established the
characters for future episodes (rather than resolve their stories),
there is no way to know where Lynch was heading with the story. Perhaps
the series would have ultimately gone down a path along the lines of
what we now see in this movie. Alternatively, Lynch may have looked at
the filmed material for the pilot and found inspiration to move in an
entirely new and fresh direction. Either way doesn't matter to me.
The final product is always of prime concern to me. In discussing
films, people often discount elements of plot in a finished film because
the shooting script (or even an earlier script draft) had now-discarded
subplots that colored the film's concepts differently. To me, that all
is merely interesting trivia. The ultimate script for a movie-- the one
that really matters-- is the transcript of what actually makes the
movie. Assuming that the final version of a film was not altered by
studio tinkering, the final film represents the creative collaboration
of the director, the writer, the editor, the cinematographer, the
actors, etc. All of them, by creatively doing their jobs, "write"
together this final script. Whatever plots and subplots were discarded
or added in the past have no real weight on what really matters-- the
final product.
Although we don't completely agree on what we saw in the final
version of "Mulholland Dr.", we both indeed liked what we saw. That
others did not like what they saw is hardly shocking. Lynch, after all,
is hardly a broad-appeal kind of filmmaker. However, just because the
film didn't work for some people (or perhaps some people didn't embrace
the work it takes to understand the film) doesn't mean this movie is not
smart, inventive, and daring.
Despite being one of the best-reviewed movies of 2001, "Mulholland
Dr." still was a hard sell to me. I saw it expecting not to like it.
To my shock, I loved it. While I'm far from a Lynch apologist, I am
grateful to him for delivering such a thought-provoking picture.
WinningerR
the movie and what is supposedly going on.<<<
I get exactly the opposite feeling. What makes you think so?
A Better Chungking_Cash
I agree. It wasn't comforting trying to make sense of a film for 2:30
mins. and then find out later that it wasn't supposed to make sense
because it was all a dream.
With the exception of "Blue Velvet," David Lynch films have always
proven to be disappointing for me. His style of direction is uncanny,
unique, bizarre, and sick in a very entertaining way. My problem with
his films, however, is that most of the scripts seem to be lacking
something, and more than often I feel like they derail his films.
Maybe I should check out "The Straight Story"?
Melquiades
>> However, I like my movies to tell a story.
>
>I agree. It wasn't comforting trying to make sense of a film for 2:30
>mins. and then find out later that it wasn't supposed to make sense
>because it was all a dream.
But it does make sense.
kentrel
>
> I bet you do not understand "pi" or "Pillow Book" either.......................
I have yet to see Pillow Book but I liked Pi very much. Sorry, you lose
the bet.
kentrel
>
> > However, I like my movies to tell a story.
>
> I agree. It wasn't comforting trying to make sense of a film for 2:30
> mins. and then find out later that it wasn't supposed to make sense
> because it was all a dream.
Yes, though you can actually make sense of it, at least partially. It's
just that when you do you wonder what was the point of making it into a
movie at all. The "it was all a dream ending" is one of the oldest and
worst cliches ever used, one of the reasons audiences felt so cheated by
the end. It was a copout.
kentrel
>
> kentrel wrote:
>
> > You see, I know what I'm talking about. You just think you do.
> The extreme irony is that you only think you know what you are talking about.
> There is no definition of "a movie" as "the telling of a story in 3-act
> form".
Your idea of a movie is not the definition of a movie set down by those
who actually make them. Movies are a the visual and auditory extension
of books. A documentary is the motion picture equivalent of a
non-fiction book. A movie is the equivalent of a novel. By definition a
novel is a narrative, so therefore its motion picture equivalent must
also be a narrative. Narrative=story. Movie=story. These are all
definitions they teach in basic film school. I can't understand how you
don't know that.
All movies begin with a screenplay, and all screenplay's *must* begin
with a story. That's the single most basic principle of screenwriting.
Any writer will tell you that, any book will tell you that, any class
will tell you that. In fact, anybody who has anything to do with the
movie industry (and they should know), even the guy who sweeps the
floor, will tell you that.
Mulholland Dr would normally come under the definition of video art but
because its Lynch it gets released as a mainstream movie. You're jumping
down my throat because you believe a movie encompasses anything that has
to do with moving pictures, when that is a common incorrect assumption.
It's like saying that a novel encompasses everything to do with written
words, when it does not. It only covers one particular style. Those
styles can also be poetry, biography, non-fiction etc.
Now do you understand?
> As to the dream *theory* to which you referred, it may account for some forms
> of dreaming, but certainly does not account for all.
Such as? What other forms of dreaming are there? Do tell. Dreams are
dreams. You'll be surprised how the environment can affect dreaming. A
sound in the night, a strange shape on the wall can be picked up by your
unconscious and translated into anything. Combine that with the RANDOM
FIRING OF NEURONS and you're going to get the usual random nonsensical
dreams. Your brain needs to do this in order perform its repairs
correctly, which is why you forget most dreams. You're supposed to
forget them, because they're not supposed to mean anything. They're just
temporary manifestations, some of which can linger in your short term
memory when you awaken (or partially awaken) in the middle of REM sleep,
and be transferred to long term memory. This has all being demonstrated
long ago by researchers. It's not just a "bit of research" taken too
far. It's science.
Regards
Kentrel
kentrel
>
> Asking people "in the film industry" to define movies is rather like
> asking the guys who own Burger King to define food.
That's not a very accurate analogy though I think I know the point
you're trying to make. Refer to one of my other posts for the definition
of a movie, as given by somebody "in the film industry". A movie isn't a
general term like "food". It has its own definition.
Thomas Andrews
> A Better Chungking_Cash wrote:
> >
> > > However, I like my movies to tell a story.
> >
> > I agree. It wasn't comforting trying to make sense of a film for 2:30
> > mins. and then find out later that it wasn't supposed to make sense
> > because it was all a dream.
>
> Yes, though you can actually make sense of it, at least partially. It's
> just that when you do you wonder what was the point of making it into a
> movie at all. The "it was all a dream ending" is one of the oldest and
> worst cliches ever used, one of the reasons audiences felt so cheated by
> the end. It was a copout.
>
> - kentrel
>
Well, I went in with the knowledge that there was an "all a dream" character
to the movie, so I took that as a given.
Actually, I think it is a little bit more than "all a dream." It's more of
a meditation on hollywood dreams and Hollywood realities. The "Betty" story
isn't just a dream, it is a dream *about* Hollywood, and it is a dream
colored by Hollywood.
So "Betty" is this idealistic, naive girl who comes to Hollywood and lives
the beautiful Hollywood life from the start, getting the beautiful "starlet"
pad even before she has her first audition. She meets a woman who has lost
her memory of who she is (both the standard Hollywood plot of amnesia *and*
a metaphor for the actor's amorphous personality.) We get snippets of
"standard" Hollywood stories - the police procedural, for example.
Another thing about the "dream" which is like a Hollywood movie is that the
dream is a re-arrangement of Diane's real life. The original scene of the
limo snaking up Mulholland in the "dream/movie" is the same as the scene in
the "real world" when it takes Diane to the party. The "dream" bases many
characters on real people. Is Diane dreaming, or is she writing a movie
version of her life? It's a little bit of both.
So, why does she imagine this old couple laughing at her? Because that
naive Betty that arrived is someone who Diane knows must be laughed at, that
must be held up to contempt. Years after she met these two people, and
confided her dreams with naive confidence, she thinks they must have been
laughing at her - how could they take that girl seriously? What a silly
girl!
Incidentally, one "analysis" of the movie I read suggested that the two men
who meet at the Winkies, one recounting the dream about the man behind the
restaurant, might be gay lovers. I didn't get that at all - they seemed
more like shrink and patient to me. Certainly, the way that the "sane" man
directs his questions seems liked trained questioning. And their
relationship doesn't seem personal. Finally, the "shrink" quickly checks
the "patients" pulse when he collapses in fear, which indicated to me some
medical training.
On a side note, does the "shrink" even react to the homeless man/monster?
He seemed to me to not even notice, which indicates that the homeless man
was the "patient's" delusion.
What does this homeless man represent? Why does he hold the cube? Well,
what does the cube represent? When it is opened, the "dream" ends and the
nasty reality begins. Unfortunately, if you cling to the "dream" in
Hollywood, you never get work. The homeless man has the cube because he
never let go of his ideals, and the horror is the consequences of that. The
fear of becoming this beast is what drives so many to abandon their ideals.
[Is the fact that the homeless "man" is played by a woman relevant?]
Watching the recent PBS special about the porn industry gives me another
angle - the first "step" for women in the porn industry is girl-girl action,
apparently. Is that why the story contains lesbian sex - another indication
in the step towards the degradation that awaits many Betty's arriving in
Hollywood?
As somebody suggested, this movie is "modern art." It is not representative
of a standard narrative. If we were to compare it to modern music, it is
more Britten than Schoenberg. It is not atonal, but rather tonal with rapid
shifts in tone. Each moment has a musical key, but the key is constantly
shifting, with the seemingly atonal moments mostly being when two different
keys collide.
=
Thomas Andrews (tho...@best.com) http://thomaso.best.vwh.net/
Dale, you giblet-head, we live in Texas. It's already 110 in
the summer, and if it gets one degree hotter, I'm gonna kick
your ass. = Hank Hill, on global warming
JoeS
delusionary opinions will not be changed.
I feel very sad for you.
Joe
Thomas Andrews
"kentrel" <ken...@mailandnews.com> wrote in message
news:3CC95D88...@mailandnews.com...
> JoeS wrote:
> >
> > kentrel wrote:
> >
> > > You see, I know what I'm talking about. You just think you do.
> > The extreme irony is that you only think you know what you are talking
about.
> > There is no definition of "a movie" as "the telling of a story in 3-act
> > form".
>
> Your idea of a movie is not the definition of a movie set down by those
> who actually make them.
So David Lynch doesn't make movies?
> Movies are a the visual and auditory extension
> of books.
Only some times. Actually, the first movies were very much about pure
visual sensation - trains coming at the audience, etc. That was the
novelty. When it comes to narrative, films have much more direct ties to
"theater," which is a much older form of popular entertainment than books.
And modern theater often doesn't tell a coherent narrative, but rather
pastiches and collages.
>A documentary is the motion picture equivalent of a
> non-fiction book. A movie is the equivalent of a novel.
Some of them seem more like poems to me. And one thing which is starting to
be done in movies nowadays is the mimic the dream state, which is a
non-narrative which at moments looks like a narrative. "Fight Club" is an
example - examine it too closely, and you realize it doesn't make sense as a
narrative, but rather works like a dream.
Also, look at the burst of the "unreliable narrator" stories recently. Much
of the "story" told by Verbal in "The Usual Suspects" doesn't make sense -
it constantly shifts because his story has a goal. The movie itself might
have a "narrative," but it is quite a spare one.
> By definition a novel is a narrative,
You are making two leaps here - that the novel is narrative (most are, some
are not) and that movies are just novels told with pictures (they can be so
many more things.)
>so therefore its motion picture equivalent must
> also be a narrative. Narrative=story. Movie=story. These are all
> definitions they teach in basic film school. I can't understand how you
> don't know that.
They might teach that in film school, but that doesn't make it so.
Actually, a lot of the films that come from film school students are
non-narratives. They probably teach students this because if a student
actually wants to "make it" in films, he probably has to tell a story. But
that doesn't mean that all movies tell a story, just that he isn't likely to
make much money if he is more experimental.
>
> All movies begin with a screenplay, and all screenplay's *must* begin
> with a story. That's the single most basic principle of screenwriting.
No, it isn't. It is definitely the basic principle of *commercial*
screenwriting, but not all screenwriting.
> Any writer will tell you that, any book will tell you that, any class
> will tell you that.
That's because to get started, to get a "chance" in films, you have to tell
a story. But that doesn't mean it is a necessity.
>In fact, anybody who has anything to do with the
> movie industry (and they should know), even the guy who sweeps the
> floor, will tell you that.
Yeah, well, the guy who sweeps the floor is the most likely to insist on a
coherent story - executives don't
>
> Mulholland Dr would normally come under the definition of video art but
> because its Lynch it gets released as a mainstream movie.
Hardly "mainstream" - it got released in art houses, and its advertising was
slight.
I think we will all agree that "Mulholland Dr" is not a mainstream movie.
But you are insisting that if it isn't a "mainstream movie" it isn't a
movie, which is ludicrous.
Why is it "video art," if it was released on film to theaters? Was it shot
on video? If the same pictures were shot on film, would it become a
"movie?"
>You're jumping
> down my throat because you believe a movie encompasses anything that has
> to do with moving pictures, when that is a common incorrect assumption.
> It's like saying that a novel encompasses everything to do with written
> words, when it does not.
You have made up your own definition of "movie." A documentary is a
"movie." It is also a "documentary." If someone says, "Wanna rent a
movie?" I might say, "Yeah, how about 'The Thin Blue Line.'" You won't find
any definition of "movie" that requires fictional narrative; certainly, it
is not the definition of "movie" in the dictionary.
A friend of mine used to make a distinction between "films" and "movies,"
but he included "films" as a subset of "movies," and used the term to mean
"serious movies," somehow. I tended to use the two words interchangeably,
but that's because I have been a photography hobbyist, so I think of the
term "film" as a medium rather than a quality issue.
> It only covers one particular style. Those
> styles can also be poetry, biography, non-fiction etc.
>
> Now do you understand?
>
That you are making up definitions to fit your needs? Sure.
madkevin
> A Better Chungking_Cash wrote:
> >
> > > However, I like my movies to tell a story.
> >
> > I agree. It wasn't comforting trying to make sense of a film for 2:30
> > mins. and then find out later that it wasn't supposed to make sense
> > because it was all a dream.
>
> Yes, though you can actually make sense of it, at least partially. It's
> just that when you do you wonder what was the point of making it into a
> movie at all. The "it was all a dream ending" is one of the oldest and
> worst cliches ever used, one of the reasons audiences felt so cheated by
> the end. It was a copout.
>
> - kentrel
Two things to add here:
I don't believe it's fair to make the assumption that "audiences" felt cheated by the
ending, nor do I think it's fair to describe it as a cop-out. I think Lynch used the
admittedly cliched dream ending in an interesting manner, and judging from the
critical response it appears that many people consider "Mulholland Dr" to be an
artistically satisfying picture. To generalize that all audiences everywhere agree
that "Mulholland Dr." is a cop-out is simply not true.
Second: Even if you discount the dream structure entirely, you can still relate to
the movie as a satire of film noir conventions, and even as a satire of Hollywood
itself. That extra dimension on top of the dream-structure is one of the most
satisfying elements of "Mulholland Dr."
Kevin "Plus, There's Nudity! Don't Forget The Nudity!" Cogliano
JoeS
> That you are making up definitions to fit your needs? Sure.
Your response is very much along the lines I was considering, but felt the time
expenditure wasn't worth it.
I'll add a "me too" and leave it at that. Thanks.
Joe
Richard ©ç® ²ºº²
"kentrel" <ken...@mailandnews.com> wrote in message news:3CC95D88...@mailandnews.com...
: Movies are a the visual and auditory extension
: of books.
========================
Source for such a narrow defintion?
=========================
: A documentary is the motion picture equivalent of a
: non-fiction book.
===================================
Again - very exclusive definition.
===================================
: A movie is the equivalent of a novel. By definition a
: novel is a narrative, so therefore its motion picture equivalent must
: also be a narrative. Narrative=story. Movie=story. These are all
: definitions they teach in basic film school. I can't understand how you
: don't know that.
====================
by your own definition, MD is indeed a movie..............
====================
:
: All movies begin with a screenplay, and all screenplay's *must* begin
: with a story.
=========================
Really? How did you determine this?
==========================
: That's the single most basic principle of screenwriting.
: Any writer will tell you that, any book will tell you that, any class
: will tell you that. In fact, anybody who has anything to do with the
: movie industry (and they should know), even the guy who sweeps the
: floor, will tell you that.
:
: Mulholland Dr would normally come under the definition of video art
====================
And just where did you define THAT term?
====================
: but
: because its Lynch it gets released as a mainstream movie. You're jumping
: down my throat because you believe a movie encompasses anything that has
: to do with moving pictures,
======================
In the REAL world, that is indeed what it is.........
========================
: when that is a common incorrect assumption.
: It's like saying that a novel encompasses everything to do with written
: words, when it does not. It only covers one particular style. Those
: styles can also be poetry, biography, non-fiction etc.
:
: Now do you understand?
========================
Only that you have defined the world in YOUR terms.
=========================
:
kentrel
> So David Lynch doesn't make movies?
Where did David Lynch give his definition?
> >A documentary is the motion picture equivalent of a
> > non-fiction book. A movie is the equivalent of a novel.
> > By definition a novel is a narrative,
>
> You are making two leaps here - that the novel is narrative (most
are, some
> are not) and that movies are just novels told with pictures (they can
be so
> many more things.)
All novels are. That's the definition of a novel. A novel is a book with
narrative. www.m-w.com has a nice definition of it.
> >so therefore its motion picture equivalent must
> > also be a narrative. Narrative=story. Movie=story. These are all
> > definitions they teach in basic film school. I can't understand how
you
> > don't know that.
>
> They might teach that in film school, but that doesn't make it so.
That doesn't make sense. Why would they teach it, if it wasn't true.
> Actually, a lot of the films that come from film school students are
> non-narratives. They probably teach students this because if a
student
> actually wants to "make it" in films, he probably has to tell a
story.
I'd agree with that. Film schools generally encourage experimentation,
and that sometimes includes non-narratives, or alternative structures
(like Memento, but which is still narrative). But like I said in a
previous post, film and movies are seperate things. Film is the
superset, and movies are the subset from it.
I'd recommend you see Ghost World if you haven't seen it already.
Besides being a great a movie it has something interesting to say about
art teachers versus art students, which is a lot like how film studies
courses teach film. i.e. the teacher's often (unfairly but probably
unknowingly) praise the students who imitate their style, and criticise
the students who don't. That could probably be said for most teachers
I'm sorry to say.
> > All movies begin with a screenplay, and all screenplay's *must*
begin
> > with a story. That's the single most basic principle of
screenwriting.
>
> No, it isn't. It is definitely the basic principle of *commercial*
> screenwriting, but not all screenwriting.
No. Incorrect. That's a misconception. Again I refer you to my favourite
online dictionary.
Main Entry: screen·play
Pronunciation: 'skrEn-"plA
Function: noun
Date: 1916
: the script and often shooting directions of a
story prepared for
motion-picture production
I know it seems anally retentive to have to post that, and I hate to be
anal :), but I'm trying to make a point here. These words (screenplay,
movie, etc) have definitions so that there is no misconception.
Unfortunately, that still happens hence this thread, though partly my
fault for taking this so far :P
> >In fact, anybody who has anything to do with the
> > movie industry (and they should know), even the guy who sweeps the
> > floor, will tell you that.
>
> Yeah, well, the guy who sweeps the floor is the most likely to insist
on a
> coherent story - executives don't
Actually, its the other way around. This is one of the things I dislike
about the industry today. Most executives, especially today, will not
take the risk with a non-coherent story. M. Dr. would never have been
made without the Lynch name attached to it. Memento only got made
because Chris Nolan had written a genius script and promised a tiny
budget ($5m), and a short shooting schedule (25 days). If that movie
bombed they would have only lost $5m, peanuts where the average budget
at the moment is $50 million. The problem with studios today is they are
so unwilling to take a risk. A reason I applaude Lynch, don't get me
wrong. I've expressed my respect for him elsewhere. But I'm still
adamant that M. Dr doesn't come under the category of "movie".
> >
> > Mulholland Dr would normally come under the definition of video art but
> > because its Lynch it gets released as a mainstream movie.
>
> Hardly "mainstream" - it got released in art houses, and its advertising was
> slight.
Some of the major multiplexes here (Edinburgh) ran it for a long while.
I think some still are throughout the UK.
> I think we will all agree that "Mulholland Dr" is not a mainstream
movie.
> But you are insisting that if it isn't a "mainstream movie" it isn't
a
> movie, which is ludicrous.
No. I'm not saying that at all. I'm just saying its not a movie, period.
It's video art. I don't say that because of a distorted perspective as
another poster seems to think. I just say that as a matter of course. A
movie, at its most fundamental level must tell a story. Any story.
You make the argument that M. Dr does in fact tell a story. I disagree,
though I still respect your opinion. The story M. Dr tells only becomes
apparent at the end where you are told to disregard everything you've
seen up until then. So, the story only exists after you remove the first
2/3 of the film. That's not right. I don't care about non-mainstream,
non-coherent Lynchisms, if you are told 2/3 of the way into a story that
what you were just told didn't happen then why bother to tell that at
all? Why not just tell the last 1/3 of the film? Particularly when the
first 2/3 of the story was never finished in the first place. What
happened with Theroux's character? Nothing was resolved. Mullholland Dr.
consists of the first 2/3 of one story, and the last 1/3 of another
story. That is just not acceptable for a movie. It's a fantastic piece
of video art, and if I was a judge in a Video Art contest I would
happily give it 10/10 but a movie it aint.
> You have made up your own definition of "movie."
It's not my own definition. It's just *the* definition. I hope I
explained it clearly, somewhere up in all that mess :)
> That you are making up definitions to fit your needs? Sure.
No. I use a dictionary for my definitions.
kentrel
> : All movies begin with a screenplay, and all screenplay's *must*
begin
> : with a story.
>
> =========================
> Really? How did you determine this?
> ==========================
Its common knowledge to anybody who's read Goldman, Trottier, McKee or
others. Not to mention anybody with access to a dictionary.
> ========================
> Only that you have defined the world in YOUR terms.
> =========================
Not unless I defined the English language.
kentrel
> 1.. A sequence of photographs projected onto a screen with
sufficient rapidity as
> to create the illusion of motion and continuity.
> 2.. A connected cinematic narrative represented in this form.
> 2.. A showing of a movie. Often used in the plural: During the
movie, the person in
> front of me kept talking. Would you like to go to the movies tonight?
> 3.. movies The movie industry.
You've just proved my point. A connected cinematic narrative represented
in this form. keyword: narrative
Definition Number 1 simply defines a movable picture, anything such as
news, documentaries, cartoons, or even CCTV footage. You wouldn't call
the news a movie would you, simply because its a "sequence of
photographs projected onto a screen with sufficient rapidity as to
create the illusion of motion and continuity"
Definition Number 2 refers to what we watch at the cinema. A connected
cinematic narrative. A movie is the narrative form.
You've just found the dictionary definition which agrees with my point.
Yet you think it disproves it? I'm not sure if thats funny or sad.
> Movies are an art form. Narrative is merely one element that an art
form can take,
> but there is no art form in which narrative is a requirement.
You have this the wrong way around. Movies are the narrative element of
film and video. Dictionary.com defines that, m-w.com defines that,
<insert your favourite dictionary here> defines it.
> That includes the
> novel, by the way, although truly non narrative novels are quite
rare.
There are no such things as non narrative novels. A novel *must* be a
narrative by its very definition (look it up if you don't believe me!)
> And many people like yourself are not interested in non-narrative forms.
Don't put words in my mouth. This shows you haven't read my posts
properly, in which case you should be more careful about trying to
disagree with what I say. Know what I said before you do that. I never
said I wasn't interested in non narrative forms. In fact, I've mentioned
several times in this thread how interesting I found Mulholland Dr. and
how I respect Lynch for making it but what I insist on is that it is
video art, not a movie. That's the argument I'm making.
It would be nice if you would read my posts more carefully next time.
After all, I gave you the same respect. Whether you were deserving of it
or not is another issue.
> But that doesn't mean that they don't exist,
> and it doesn't follow that all films must be narrative.
Film and movies are different things. Is there an echo here? Am I
repeating myself. Film is the superset. Movies are the subset. Film
encompasses everything to do with motion pictures, whether they were
shot in film or video is irrelevant. Movies are the narrative element of
film.
> For bonus points, try to define the term "comic book".
Why? Look up a dictionary if you want to know. You should have enough
practise by now.
Regards
kentrel
ClckwrkO
::::::a bunch of crap concerning the movie Mulholland Drive::::::
It's clear you're very intelligent. It's also clear that you know a lot about
dreams.
But you're totally missing the point about this movie.. Sure, the movie
utilises a dream, but in a way that's never been done before. Maybe you can't
see past the cliche.
The movie does follow a narrative, but also in a way that's never been done
before. That you suppose that it has no narrative tells me that you either
didn't look for it or you just don't want to see it. It's easy to miss unless
you work a little bit, but it is there.
It seems to me that Mulholland Drive is a movie you didn't want to like and so
you don't.
I think it's brilliant. And not because Lynch did it. It's brilliant because
it's groundbreakingly original, beautiful, extremely well acted, and
intelligent.
That's just my opinion, your mileage may vary.
ClckwrkO
madkevin
> madkevin wrote:
> > 1.. A sequence of photographs projected onto a screen with
> sufficient rapidity as
> > to create the illusion of motion and continuity.
> > 2.. A connected cinematic narrative represented in this form.
> > 2.. A showing of a movie. Often used in the plural: During the
> movie, the person in
> > front of me kept talking. Would you like to go to the movies tonight?
> > 3.. movies The movie industry.
>
> You've just proved my point. A connected cinematic narrative represented
> in this form. keyword: narrative
>
> Definition Number 1 simply defines a movable picture, anything such as
> news, documentaries, cartoons, or even CCTV footage. You wouldn't call
> the news a movie would you, simply because its a "sequence of
> photographs projected onto a screen with sufficient rapidity as to
> create the illusion of motion and continuity"
Actually, I would. That's my point. A cartoon is an animated movie. A documentary is
a movie. These are all movies. "Narrative" is a smaller subest of art, not the other
way around.
I would refer you to the excellent textbook "A History Of Narrative Film" by David
Cook for a more in-depth definition of what constitutes narrative cinema.
> Definition Number 2 refers to what we watch at the cinema. A connected
> cinematic narrative. A movie is the narrative form.
I have seen a shortened version of Warhol's "Empire State" at a cinema. Ditto "Last
Of England" and "Blue", by Derek Jarman, which is not only non-narrative but doesn't
actually feature any images at all except for the same shade of blue exposed to each
frame of film. I have seen a number of purely abstract animated short films at a
cinema. These, and many more, are all considered movies.
> You've just found the dictionary definition which agrees with my point.
> Yet you think it disproves it? I'm not sure if thats funny or sad.
Read the first bit again.
> > Movies are an art form. Narrative is merely one element that an art
> form can take,
> > but there is no art form in which narrative is a requirement.
>
> You have this the wrong way around. Movies are the narrative element of
> film and video. Dictionary.com defines that, m-w.com defines that,
> <insert your favourite dictionary here> defines it.
The term "movie" and "film" are interchangable in relation to "motion pictures".
> > That includes the
> > novel, by the way, although truly non narrative novels are quite
> rare.
>
> There are no such things as non narrative novels. A novel *must* be a
> narrative by its very definition (look it up if you don't believe me!)
Actually, there are. There have been novels written on cards that come in a box,
where you shuffle the cards to produce prose poems. There are the cut-up techniques
of Burroughs which eschewed the notion of narrative altogether. There have been
novels written as dictionaries, or as concordances to imaginary works. These are all
novels. Or, to put it in your terminology: Take an undergraduate degree in English if
you don't believe me.
> > And many people like yourself are not interested in non-narrative forms.
>
> Don't put words in my mouth. This shows you haven't read my posts
> properly, in which case you should be more careful about trying to
> disagree with what I say. Know what I said before you do that. I never
> said I wasn't interested in non narrative forms. In fact, I've mentioned
> several times in this thread how interesting I found Mulholland Dr. and
> how I respect Lynch for making it but what I insist on is that it is
> video art, not a movie. That's the argument I'm making.
>
> It would be nice if you would read my posts more carefully next time.
> After all, I gave you the same respect. Whether you were deserving of it
> or not is another issue.
And here's the point where the conversation ends. If you insist on resorting to
personal attacks and ad hominem remarks, there's nothing left to discuss. My remark
was not intended as an attack, although you've decided to treat it as such.
Kevin "Back To The Noise" Cogliano
Folco
> > madkevin wrote:
[cut]
> Again, the central disagreement here is that I don't nessesarily have to throw out
> those fantastical or random elements to have a story. Let's take, for example, the
> most surreal element of the film, Club Silencio. Aside from the usual Lynchian
> fascinations with red drapery, the Club reveals a pivotal moment in understanding
> Diane's character: as the chanteuse on the stage lip-syncs to a Spanish version of
> Roy Orbinson's "Crying", Diane comes to the shattering realization that this fantasy
> world she has created is not real, and she shakes uncontrollably. The seeming
> surrealistic elements are grounded in a perfectly understandable psychological
> reality - a first for Lynch, perhaps.
Club Silencio in my opinion is one of the most important parts of the
movie.
It's the place where Diane-Betty realizes that "no hay banda, it's all
an illusion". We should realize this, too...
BTW, when the Club manager introduces the singer, he says "la Llorona
de Los Angeles". "La Llorona" is a Spanish legend about a beautiful
woman who murders her two children out of jealousy because her husband
is betraying her.
Oh, yes, does anyone have an interpretation of the fact that "Cookie"
(Park Hotel's manager) is also Club Silencio's manager?
[cut]
Folco
Smaug69
> John Harkness wrote:
> >
> > Asking people "in the film industry" to define movies is rather like
> > asking the guys who own Burger King to define food.
>
> That's not a very accurate analogy though I think I know the point
> you're trying to make.
You really don't.
> Refer to one of my other posts for the definition
> of a movie, as given by somebody "in the film industry". A movie isn't a
> general term like "food". It has its own definition.
Sorry, but(having seen your other posts) you have no idea what you are
talking about. Movies aren't just limited to telling visual stories.
That's just one aspect of a much larger world. In fact, movies don't
have to tell any kind of story. And, believe it or not, all movies are
visual(video, as you put it) art.
And documentaries are not non-fiction if they mostly rely on people's
memories of events and whatnot.
Smaug69(If dreams are random nonsense then why are so many of the ones
I have recurring?)
andy
> angle - the first "step" for women in the porn industry is girl-girl
action,
> apparently. Is that why the story contains lesbian sex - another
indication
> in the step towards the degradation that awaits many Betty's arriving in
> Hollywood?
Extremely doubtful. The far-more-likely reason is because David Lynch is a
perv.
I have to agree with kentrel. I cant even pretend to give Mulholland Drive a
fair shake, because I know the
ending was tacked on. I know the first 2 hours had no conclusion, and, from
Lynch's past track record (Twin Peaks) had no real hope of a conclusion. I
could practically *see* Lynch rubbing his hands together dressed up as P.T.
Barnum when
the movie went south after 2 hours.
Maybe its my own fault? Don't get me wrong, I'm in complete disagreement
with kentrel's definition of what a 'Movie' is. I thoroughly enjoyed Waking
Life, which IMO was a much better take on dream-as-movie.
Y'know, cuz it had a *point* and stuff...
kentrel
since I've already explained and demonstrated this remarkably simplistic
concept to you several times already.
madkevin wrote:
> Actually, I would. That's my point. A cartoon is an animated movie. A
documentary is
> a movie. These are all movies. "Narrative" is a smaller subest of
art, not the other
> way around.
That's all wrong. That's just in your opinion. Your still holding on to
this belief you have without using any sources. You seem to believe that
the word movie refers to *anything* that's a movable picture. The word
has TWO definitions. The first is the original definition as defined
circa 1912 as a short name for the new technology, the second is the
evolved (read: updated) term which is what's used today. The news is not
a motion picture by definition 2.
> I would refer you to the excellent textbook "A History Of Narrative
Film" by David
> Cook for a more in-depth definition of what constitutes narrative
cinema.
I've read it. Its on my shelf at home along with the equally fine "Lost
Illusions". He doesn't contradict anything I've said. Haven't you read
it?
> > Definition Number 2 refers to what we watch at the cinema. A
connected
> > cinematic narrative. A movie is the narrative form.
>
> I have seen a shortened version of Warhol's "Empire State" at a
cinema. Ditto "Last
> Of England" and "Blue", by Derek Jarman, which is not only
non-narrative but doesn't
> actually feature any images at all except for the same shade of blue
exposed to each
> frame of film. I have seen a number of purely abstract animated short
films at a
> cinema. These, and many more, are all considered movies.
By who? You? Using Andy Warhol as an example here, whose movies consist
of a 24 hour shot of the Empire State building, an eight hour movie of a
guy asleep, a 35 minute movie of a guy getting a blow job, is a very
tentative argument. You consider them movies yet Warhol's work has split
critics all over the world. I've read much about Warhol and I've had the
displeasure at seeing much of his work and never have I ever heard
anybody (except for you today) refer to them as movies. Ever.
I'll repeat. Film is the superset. Movie is the subset.
> > You've just found the dictionary definition which agrees with my
point.
> > Yet you think it disproves it? I'm not sure if thats funny or sad.
>
> Read the first bit again.
Is the first bit the only part you're paying attention to? Then your
definition of "movie" is the same definition as first coined in 1912. It
has being updated since then. Hence def. 2.
> The term "movie" and "film" are interchangeable in relation to
"motion pictures".
*sigh*
Again. No. Reason stated elsewhere.
> Actually, there are. There have been novels written on cards that
come in a box,
> where you shuffle the cards to produce prose poems.
That's poetry. COMPLETELY DIFFERENT LITERARY GENRE. Sheesh.
> There are the cut-up techniques
> of Burroughs which eschewed the notion of narrative altogether. There
have been
> novels written as dictionaries, or as concordances to imaginary
works. These are all
> novels.
It doesn't matter how they're presented whether they are written on the
inside of a box of smarties or not. A novel is a narrative. Period. It
*must* follow a narrative *in order* to be called a novel. That is not a
difficult concept to understand. it is exactly what the dictionary says.
Main Entry: novel
Function: noun
Etymology: Italian novella
Date: 1639
1 : an invented prose narrative that is usually
long and complex and
deals especially with human experience through a
usually connected
sequence of events
2 : the literary genre consisting of novels
You mention Burroughs cut-up technique. Would it to interest you to know
that *all* writing is in fact cut-ups. Burroughs states this himself.
Burrough's technique just extends this to allow a more flexible
variation of story telling or experimentation. What Burroughs often did
was use other peoples work juxtaposed along with his own to create a
final work. The final work, if its a narrative prose, is still a novel.
He wrote several novels using this technique. Take a look at this site
and read a quote from Burroughs at the bottom where he describes what he
does.
http://www.spress.de/author/burroughs/Lit/Articles/Skerl/cutups.htm
He doesn't eschew narrative prose whatsover. In fact he says "Perfectly
clear narrative prose can be produced using the fold in method". Hardly
avoiding prose at all, as your comment suggests. You should get a degree
in English yourself before you claim knowledge of such.
>Or, to put it in your terminology: Take an undergraduate degree in
English if
> you don't believe me.
If you have a degree in English (and I very much doubt it) then I'm
shocked that you completely misunderstood Burroughs. Let me guess, you
spent that lecture watching Warhol's Empire? Blowjob? Sleep? Or were you
actually Warhol's subject.
> > > And many people like yourself are not interested in non-narrative
forms.
> >
> > Don't put words in my mouth. This shows you haven't read my posts
> > properly, in which case you should be more careful about trying to
> > disagree with what I say. Know what I said before you do that. I
never
> > said I wasn't interested in non narrative forms. In fact, I've
mentioned
> > several times in this thread how interesting I found Mulholland Dr.
and
> > how I respect Lynch for making it but what I insist on is that it
is
> > video art, not a movie. That's the argument I'm making.
> >
> > It would be nice if you would read my posts more carefully next
time.
> > After all, I gave you the same respect. Whether you were deserving
of it
> > or not is another issue.
>
> And here's the point where the conversation ends. If you insist on
resorting to
> personal attacks and ad hominem remarks, there's nothing left to
discuss. My remark
> was not intended as an attack, although you've decided to treat it as
such.
I'm scratching my head at that remark. Where was the personal attack.
Read those paragraphs again. In the first I defended myself when you
claimed I said something which I did not say. I then told you to read my
posts more carefully. It was obvious you weren't, otherwise you wouldn't
have made your original remark.
In the second paragraph I said it would be nice if you did read my posts
more carefully, followed by a statement that I gave you the same
respect, and lastly a suggestion as to whether you deserved respect or
not.
I can't see where the insult is. It would be nice of you to point it
out. You didn't read my posts properly. I know you didn't. You know you
didn't. That "And many people like yourself are not interested in
non-narrative forms" statement proved you didn't therefore what I said
was true. A simple statement of fact.
If you consider "Whether you were deserving of it or not is another
issue" an ad hominem attack then you are jumping to conclusions. I
didn't say you were undeserving of respect. I simply said the fact that
you deserve it or not was not an issue, I still treated you with respect
anyway.
*sigh*. Why do I bother?
If you studied my posts more carefully you really would be more
enlightened. Until you do, its adios from me.
> Kevin "Back To The Noise" Cogliano
Regards
kentrel "I don't need a middle name" kentrel
kentrel
> Sorry, but(having seen your other posts) you have no idea what you are
> talking about. Movies aren't just limited to telling visual stories.
> That's just one aspect of a much larger world. In fact, movies don't
> have to tell any kind of story. And, believe it or not, all movies are
> visual(video, as you put it) art.
You seem to suggest that I'm limiting the definition of movies. Film can
be as wide as it likes, can be anything it likes. Just like books can be
anything they like. But movies are to film, as novels are to books.
I'm not limiting it in anyway at all.
> And documentaries are not non-fiction if they mostly rely on people's
> memories of events and whatnot.
I never said otherwise. By the way thats a double negative. "And
documentaries are fiction if they mostly rely on people's memories of
events and whatnot.". Is that what you actually mean? I didn't say that.
And also, that's not necessarily true.
> Smaug69(If dreams are random nonsense then why are so many of the ones
> I have recurring?)
It depends on the type of dream. Is it a "falling" or a "can't move"
dream? If it is I'd like to know, since those are common and are whats
known as lucid dreaming. I could probably track down the cause if you
want. Usually its a simple solution. That is if you want them to stop :)
Regards
kentrel
kentrel
> Extremely doubtful. The far-more-likely reason is because David Lynch
is a
> perv.
I would agree. I seem to remember Twin Peaks the movie having a long
protracted scene with either a naked or a topless woman, while her
nakedness had little to do with furthering the plot. The sex scene in M.
Dr. has only just labelled it that "weird lesbian sex movie" among some
of my collegues.
> I have to agree with kentrel. I cant even pretend to give Mulholland
Drive a
> fair shake, because I know the
> ending was tacked on. I know the first 2 hours had no conclusion,
and, from
> Lynch's past track record (Twin Peaks) had no real hope of a
conclusion. I
> could practically *see* Lynch rubbing his hands together dressed up
as P.T.
> Barnum when
> the movie went south after 2 hours.
Yes, Lynch does strike me as a bit of a modern Andy Kaufman. Only he
understands his own work. And often he doesn't care what people think of
it, as long as it provokes a reaction.
Regards
Kentrel
A Better Chungking_Cash
> just that when you do you wonder what was the point of making it into a
> movie at all. The "it was all a dream ending" is one of the oldest and
> worst cliches ever used, one of the reasons audiences felt so cheated by
> the end. It was a copout.
I'm with you all the way. For some reason I saw a lot of overrated
movies in 2001 that started with the letter "M."
"Memento," "Muholland Dr.," "Moulin Rouge," ect. Though I have to
admit to really liking "Monster's Ball." ;)
fyns...@webtv.net
<The story M. Dr tells only becomes apparent at the end where you are
told to disregard everything you've seen up until then. So, the story
only exists after you remove the first 2/3 of the film. That's not
right. I don't care about non-mainstream, non-coherent Lynchisms, if you
are told 2/3 of the way into a story that what you were just told didn't
happen then why bother to tell that at all? Why not just tell the last
1/3 of the film?>
You've just described not only Mulholland Dr. but The Usual Suspects.
Since that film is told in flashback by an unreliable narrator, we may
assume that most of what happens in the first 2/3 of the film (more than
that, really) may be disregarded - so the "story" is told at the end,
and what story IS it? Did you see The Usual Suspects? Does that also
fall under "video art" (a really ridiculous term in the context of
discussing Mulholland Dr. or any other film). Mulholland Dr. does tell
a story - one you may not respond to, one that may be open to many
different interpretations (like many novels whose stories may be open to
many different interpretations), but there most certainly is a story.
Just as there is a story in Fritz Lang's The Woman In The Window.
And it's amusing to me that you bring up Ghost World as a "brilliant"
movie - I felt it was a film made up of scenes which told no strong
story whatsoever. It's more of a character study than a "plotted" film
with a conventional three-act structure. What they teach in film school
is that you must tell a story. WHAT that story is is up to the
individual writer. HOW they choose to tell it is also up to the
individual writer. Whether they choose to tell it conventionally or
elliptically is up to the writer. You keep harping on "video art" as
regards Mulholland Dr. But, as many have pointed out, Mulholland Dr. is
a film, shot on film, projected in theaters. You could, I suppose, call
it Cinema Art, but Video Art it isn't. If you can be a pedant (and you
are) then so can the rest of us.
Rodney
Great post man. Post of the year imo! Thanks for clearing a lot of this up.
<blu...@megsinet.CUTCAPS.net> wrote in message news:<3cc78...@goliath.newsgroups.com>...
> "Goldfinger" <goldfin...@home.com> wrote
>
> > Anyway, here's my answers to the 10 clues on the
> > back of the insert, some I got and some I didn't get.
> >
> Goldfinger,
> I agree with some of your conclusions. Given you bring up Lynch's
> ten clues on the DVD insert, I think I'll take a stab at them too:
>
> (1) "Pay particular attention in the beginning of the film : at least
> two clues are revealed before the credits."
>
> I can't say for sure how Lynch sees the structure of the film in
> his mind, but here's my take: The two scenes before the credits-- the
> jitterbug contest and the movement to the pillow-- both are struck from
> the same mold as the scenes at the film's end. These are the reality
> scenes-- more precisely, reality with a twist. In the final section of
> the film, Diane fades in and out of three mind sets: Stark reality,
> flashbacks to real events, and hallucinations that blend reality with
> Diane's obviously warped fantasies.
> As I see it, when the movie opens, we are in Diane's apartment in
> the final hours of her life. She is about to start dreaming. She will
> kill herself shortly after waking. The jitterbug contest we see was
> based on the real event that Diane later says inspired her to become an
> actress. In other words, it is based on the reality of the final
> section of the movie rather than the shuffled reality of the dream
> section. Clearly this is not a flashback, but rather a hallucination.
> In a hyper surge, she recalls winning the contest (but visualizes it
> with psychedelic imagery) as she basks in the spotlight with an
> important (to her) old couple. Maybe they are her parents. Maybe they
> are the judges of the contest. One thing they clearly are NOT is a
> couple she just met on an airplane (as the dream recasts them). Whoever
> they are, she sees them as the ones who were there at her first step
> toward stardom. As when they shared that one moment of success with
> her, they return later (in another hallucination) to push her over the
> edge when all hopes of success are gone.
> The snap transitions between manic hallucinations and depressing
> reality we see in the final section of the movie are previewed in the
> opener as the contest vision crumbles into the stark reality of her
> apartment. I love the way Lynch sets apart the reality segments of the
> movie. Diane has obviously been holed up there for days, perhaps weeks.
> Outside light is sealed off. Everything is silent except for perhaps
> her breathing. There's almost a musty scent to the air as we look
> around the darkened room. Then the point-of-view takes us to the pillow
> and to the dream. The two clues? The jitterbug contest is connected to
> the reality section at the film's end and the pillow indicates the
> beginning of the dream. Everything before the pillow fade-out is not
> part of the dream, but rather part of her confused state of reality.
>
> (2) "Notice appearances of the red lampshade."
>
> Diane's dream starts out the way she subconsciously wants Hollywood
> to be. She's now the talented, charming, and always helpful Betty. Her
> former lover is not dead from the paid hit and is now the loving and
> dependent Rita. Her aunt is not dead but rather going on a trip.
> Meanwhile, bad things are happening to her real-life rival Adam. As the
> dream goes on, however, reality slowly creeps in on this lovely
> dreamscape. One of the earliest examples of this is the "Girl is
> missing" section. Here the phone calls about the botched limo hit
> eventually end with an unanswered phone on the table with the red
> lampshaded light in Diane's apartment. The real Diane, who is not the
> ultra-sweetie Betty, begins here to blend into the dream. Eventually,
> Betty will find her own bloated, long-dead body in that apartment
> (probably an indication that she has been mulling over the possibility
> of suicide long before she ultimately does pull the trigger for real).
> Later, by the way, in the reality section, Diane answers the same phone
> by the same lamp.
>
> (3) "Can you hear the title of the film that Adam Kesher is auditioning
> actresses for?"
>
> Yes-- "The Sylvia North Story".
>
> "Is it mentioned again?"
>
> Yes-- in the reality section, during the party conversation. The
> key thing to notice is that this movie exists in both the dream and
> reality. However, the circumstances are quite different: Adam is the
> director of this movie in the dream (making him the hapless recipient of
> Hollywood's brutal side). In reality, the director is Bob Brooker, the
> stupid director in her dream at her audition (notice there he was the
> only one who couldn't recognize her obvious talent). Camilla Rhodes is
> the movie's star in the dream. This Camilla, however, is the unnamed
> woman who kisses the real Camilla at the party. This dream Camilla is
> also pushed onto the director by little Mr. Roque and the Castigliane
> Brothers ("this is the girl"). A similar headshot photo of the real
> Camilla is passed to the hit man by Diane with the same "this is the
> girl" statement. These are all examples of how things from Diane's real
> life are reshuffled and twisted in her dream.
>
> (4) "An accident is a terrible event . . . notice the location of the
> accident."
>
> The accident happens at the same spot where Camilla leads Diane to
> the fateful party. Lynch points out that an accident is a terrible
> event. The same can be said of that party. As ApplesOran mentioned in
> another note here, there is a "Wizard Of Oz" sort of transformation of
> the characters between the dream and reality sequences. This is
> particularly true of the party. Lynch is pointing here to pay close
> attention to every detail of this party. A momentary glimpse at the
> party (e.g. the exiting man in a cowboy hat) can lead to a major player
> in the dream (the Cowboy).
>
> (5) "Who gives a key and why?"
>
> The key is given by the hit man. He is going to leave it on
> Diane's table as a signal that he has killed Camilla. In the dream,
> again a part of reality slowly creeping in, the hit man's payoff cash
> and a stylized version of the key are both found in Rita's purse. That
> key is the first step toward unlocking the blue box we later see. When
> the blue box is opened, the dream is over. I take this to mean the blue
> box is the horrible reality Diane is trying to dream away.
>
> (6) "Notice the robe, the ashtray, the coffee cup."
>
> These three items instantly change when Diane sees Camilla on the
> sofa.
> The piano-shaped ashtray was reclaimed by the neighbor in the real
> section of the movie. Moments later, as Diane and Camilla are topless
> on the sofa, the ashtray is back on the table. The robe Diane had on is
> gone, replaced by cutoff shorts. The coffee cup she held becomes a
> drink in a glass. Lynch is making sure we know here that this is not a
> hallucination but rather a flashback. This is an earlier but recent
> time, when the ashtray was still there and Diane looks much less
> world-weary. Distinguishing this scene from a hallucination is
> important because Camilla's rejection of Diane really happened. This
> set off the cycle of madness that ultimately doomed them both.
>
> (7) "What is felt, realized, and gathered at the club Silencio?"
>
> At the Club Silencio, the reality of Diane's life all but crashes
> into her escapist dream as Betty. Notice her shudders as the emcee
> onstage says "this is all an illusion". Her escape is not valid. And
> though she can hold Camilla/Rita in her dreams, the facts of their
> situation are spelled out in the words of the song "Crying" that Rebekah
> del Rio sings to them in Spanish-- especially this final verse:
>
> I thought that I was over you
> But it's true, oo so true
> I love you even more
> Than I did before
> But darling what can I do
> For you don't love me and I'll always be
>
> Crying over you, crying over you
> Yes, now you're gone and from this moment on
> I'll be crying
>
> Here at Club Silencio, the final step back to reality is found in
> Diane's purse: The blue box.
>
> (8) "Did talent alone help Camilla?"
>
> In actuality, probably. The man next to Diane at the party
> immediately says how great Camilla was in "The Sylvia North Story" when
> Diane mentions the film. And in reality, Camilla's boyfriend did not
> direct the movie; Bob Brooker did. Thus, she didn't get credit (as far
> as we know) for sleeping with the director. In Diane's eyes, however,
> she deserved the part more than Camilla. Not surprisingly, the dream
> version of Camilla only gets the job through evil backroom deals.
>
> (9) "Note the occurrences surrounding the man behind Winkie's"
>
> In the dream sequence, a man tells another man about his
> nightmare. In it, he sees a monstrous man behind the Winkie's. The two
> men then go out back to confront the fear. The sudden appearance then
> of the "monster" knocks the man with the nightmare to the ground. We
> later see that this man was at the counter at Winkie's when Diane made
> her deal with the hit man. We also see that the monster is actually
> just a homeless man in reality, someone transformed into something else
> by the dream (like so many others). But wait! The homeless man is a
> monster in her reality too. He is the one with the blue box now as her
> flashback becomes a hallucination of the return of the old people. It's
> as if this monster has been unleashed at the very site of Diane's
> lowest, most evil deed-- the contract on Camilla's life. There's no
> turning back. She has given up all hope for happiness and success.
> From the box, the old couple return now taunting and laughing. The
> people there with her at her greatest success are now there in her mind
> to drive her completely mad. After she kills herself, the first thing
> we see again is the monster-- the embodiment of her greatest sin and
> ultimate downfall. However, we also then see Diane and Camille together
> again.
>
> (10) "Where's Aunt Ruth?"
>
> At the party, Diane says she is dead. This is one of the first
> clues (of many at the party) indicating the "reality" of the earlier
> scenes of the movie (in which Aunt Ruth was alive) have actually been
> altered and reshuffled from real people who are Diane's relatives,
> friends, lovers, acquaintances, or even people she momentarily glances
> at.
>
> Jay
> 4/25/02
> http://members.core.com/~bluejay/
>
>
>
>
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andy
> Drive a
> > fair shake, because I know the
> > ending was tacked on. I know the first 2 hours had no conclusion,
> and, from
> > Lynch's past track record (Twin Peaks) had no real hope of a
> conclusion. I
> > could practically *see* Lynch rubbing his hands together dressed up
> as P.T.
> > Barnum when
> > the movie went south after 2 hours.
>
> Yes, Lynch does strike me as a bit of a modern Andy Kaufman. Only he
> understands his own work. And often he doesn't care what people think of
> it, as long as it provokes a reaction.
Well, I like Andy Kaufman, and I like David Lynch in general. I'm not a huge
fan, but I enjoy them. I also enjoy Harmony Korine, which I imagine you must
detest even more!
I just thought in particular this film was fundamentally flawed from the
get-go. Then again, I did pay to see it, so who's laughing now? :-)
WinningerR
who actually make them. Movies are a the visual and auditory extension
of books. A documentary is the motion picture equivalent of a
non-fiction book. A movie is the equivalent of a novel. By definition a
novel is a narrative, so therefore its motion picture equivalent must
also be a narrative.<<<
Where was this definition "set down" and by whom, exactly?
WinningerR
narrative.<<<
I'll except that definition of a novel, though I think you have a very limited
view as to what consitutes a "narrative."
MULHOLLAND DRIVE does have a narrative. It's a fractured and somewhat
unreliable narrative, but it's certainly a narrative. If you're going to
exclude this sort of non-convential narrative, your definition of a novel
automatically excludes several works that are generally regarded as
masterpieces -- Joyce's ULYSSES, for example. Likewise, if you extend your
definition to film you're excluding dozens of recognized classics, including
virtually the entire output of a couple of acknowledged masters like Fellini
and Bunuel.
madkevin
One small note of clarification: I do in fact have a B.A. in English from St.
Jerome's College at the University of Waterloo. Even more humourously, I have a minor
in Film. And yet, I simply cannot explain why my professor invariably referred to the
works of Andy Warhol as "movies".
Also note that your original bone of contention was that "Mulholland Dr" wasn't a
movie. By your own definition of "movie" - something we clearly disagree on - it is:
it has a narrative. Could it be you are perhaps mistaken on other counts as well?
Kevin "Small Snack For Thought" Cogliano
JoeS
> kentrel "I don't need a middle name" kentrel
I dub thee "kentrel 'Max C.' kentrel"
Joe
blu...@megsinet.cutcaps.net
> Hey Bluejay,
>
> Great post man. Post of the year imo! Thanks
> for clearing a lot of this up.
>
Rodney,
Thanks for the nice words.
I've enjoyed writing about this movie, and I can see others do
too. The source material lends itself well to contemplation and
personal interpretation. My posts reflect how I have cleared up the
mysteries of "Mulholland Dr." to my satisfaction. Meanwhile others have
reached differing conclusions that are nevertheless personally
satisfying to them. In the end, that's what is truly great about this
movie. You can personalize the viewing experience by coming to your own
conclusions about it. There's absolutely a satisfying story in this
movie if people are simply willing to look for it.
Jay
4/26/02
Norman Wilner
news:ba8kcususff2igguh...@4ax.com...
>> on Fri, 26 Apr 2002 15:00:40 +0100, kentrel wrote
>> <3CC95D88...@mailandnews.com>
>>
>> Your idea of a movie is not the definition of a movie set down
>> by those who actually make them.
>
I haven't, yet -- too busy reading the other responses in the thread -- but
as far as I'm concerned, movies don't _need_ narratives any more than novels
do.
Norm "Ask James Joyce, or William Beaudine" Wilner
Starweek Magazine/MetroToday
www.zap2it.com/movies/videodvd
Joshua Zyber
> > Smaug69(If dreams are random nonsense then why are so many of the ones
> > I have recurring?)
>
> It depends on the type of dream. Is it a "falling" or a "can't move"
> dream? If it is I'd like to know, since those are common and are whats
> known as lucid dreaming.
No, that is not lucid dream. Lucid dreaming occurs when you become
consciously aware of the fact that you are dreaming, and yet the dream
continues.
The fact that you do not know this casts aspersion on all of your previous
claims of knowing what you are talking about.
(Duh.)
- Josh
Jason Hoppin
mentioned in many posts. Yes, there very clearly is both a dream and
reality world in movie, and as in all dreams objects that exist in
reality take on new symbobolic power in dreams, as well as different,
but still similar, forms.
One of these is the blue key, which looks different in the dream than
in reality. What I don't understand is this: The aunt goes back into
the apartment before leaving on her trip to get her keys. She takes
them from the counter while 'Rita' crouches underneath. But on the
aunt's keychain is a blue key. Why?
Ian Galbraith
wrote:
>A Better Chungking_Cash wrote:
>> > However, I like my movies to tell a story.
>> I agree. It wasn't comforting trying to make sense of a film for 2:30
>> mins. and then find out later that it wasn't supposed to make sense
>> because it was all a dream.
>Yes, though you can actually make sense of it, at least partially. It's
>just that when you do you wonder what was the point of making it into a
>movie at all. The "it was all a dream ending" is one of the oldest and
>worst cliches ever used, one of the reasons audiences felt so cheated by
>the end. It was a copout.
Which audiences are these? Most people I know both online and an in real
life like the film.
--
Ian Galbraith
Email: igalb...@ozonline.com.au ICQ#: 7849631
"It is easier perceive error than to find truth, for the former lies on
the surface and is easily seen, while the latter lies in the depths,
where few are willing to search for it." - Goethe
blu...@megsinet.cutcaps.net
Jason,
I just checked that scene (it's 11 minutes, 30 seconds into the
movie). Aunt Ruth doesn't have a blue key. What may have confused you
is her beaded keychain. One of those beads is blue. The quick grab of
the keys leaves a microsecond blue blur from that bead.
Jay
4/27/02
Melquiades
>
>Maybe its my own fault? Don't get me wrong, I'm in complete disagreement
>with kentrel's definition of what a 'Movie' is. I thoroughly enjoyed Waking
>Life, which IMO was a much better take on dream-as-movie.
>
>Y'know, cuz it had a *point* and stuff...
Many, many people have discussed what they believe to be the "point" of
Mulholland Drive, and done so eloquently. Do you not see how those
interpretations fit the film, even a little bit?
Richard ©ç® ²ºº²
He changes his argument mid-stream.
First he states that ALL movies have to fit his definition and then in the last post he changes it to:
"Cook for a more in-depth definition of what constitutes narrative cinema."
From "movie" to "narative cinema" in one giant leap.........................
===============================================
"JoeS" <me....@gte.net> wrote in message news:3CC9E5A2...@gte.net...
:
John Harkness
<post-xxage@spamcop dot net> wrote:
>I was going to say the same thing.
>
>He changes his argument mid-stream.
>
>First he states that ALL movies have to fit his definition and then in the last post he changes it to:
>"Cook for a more in-depth definition of what constitutes narrative cinema."
>
>From "movie" to "narative cinema" in one giant leap.........................
>
A small step for most of us, a giant leap for kentrel.
John Harkness
kentrel
>
> I was going to say the same thing.
>
> He changes his argument mid-stream.
> "Cook for a more in-depth definition of what constitutes narrative cinema."
Actually, madkevin that said that. You moron. Think before you type.
Regards
- kentrel
kentrel
> I haven't, yet -- too busy reading the other responses in the thread -- but
> as far as I'm concerned, movies don't _need_ narratives any more than novels
> do.
It's not that novels need narratives. It's that novels *are* narratives
by their very defintion, and *must remain* so. Any other type of book
will fall under a seperate but appropriate category.
kentrel
I know plenty of people who liked the film too, and many who didn't. I
found it interesting as a piece of work. At least half the audience
walked out during the movie, both times I saw it. Of course, that's just
from my own experience, but we only speak through experience anyway,
true?.
Smaug69
incoherently:
>Smaug69 wrote:
>> Sorry, but(having seen your other posts) you have no idea what you are
>> talking about. Movies aren't just limited to telling visual stories.
>> That's just one aspect of a much larger world. In fact, movies don't
>> have to tell any kind of story. And, believe it or not, all movies are
>> visual(video, as you put it) art.
>
>You seem to suggest that I'm limiting the definition of movies. Film can
>be as wide as it likes, can be anything it likes. Just like books can be
>anything they like. But movies are to film, as novels are to books.
Of course, since we seem to be moving away from film as the media for
motion pictures it will eventually become an obselete term with
regards to the industry. However, some people will still use that term
when they mean motion picture.
A novel is a specific form of literature that doesn't necessarily have
to be printed in a book.
A movie is not a specific form of anything other than a series of
connected moving pictures. And those moving pictures can contain
anything.
>I'm not limiting it in anyway at all.
Yes, you are.
>> And documentaries are not non-fiction if they mostly rely on people's
>> memories of events and whatnot.
>
>I never said otherwise. By the way thats a double negative. "And
>documentaries are fiction if they mostly rely on people's memories of
>events and whatnot.". Is that what you actually mean?
Well, you used the word non-fiction. I was just using it in my
description. It's not a double negative since non-fiction is a
specific genre of literature. And don't give me lessons in grammar
when you can't be bothered to use an apostrophe for "that's."
> I didn't say that.
>And also, that's not necessarily true.
Actually, it is. If you rely solely or mostly on people's
recollections of past events then the source is unreliable. Memory is
a fluid thing that's always changing. It's not static.
>> Smaug69(If dreams are random nonsense then why are so many of the ones
>> I have recurring?)
>
>It depends on the type of dream. Is it a "falling" or a "can't move"
>dream? If it is I'd like to know, since those are common and are whats
>known as lucid dreaming. I could probably track down the cause if you
>want. Usually its a simple solution. That is if you want them to stop :)
Well, there are many of them and they are neither about falling nor
about being unable to move. Lucid dreams are ones that you control or
seem to control. They are rational and readily understood. And those
aren't the ones I'm talking about. I'm sorry if you believe the stuff
you've read about dreams and dreaming. It's not simple. Scientists
know very little about how the mind works during waking moments let
alone while you are sleeping. And the sincere ones will tell you that
up front.
Smaug69
incoherently:
"...mistaken on _all_ other counts as well?" is what I would have
asked.
Smaug69
incoherently:
>Oh God. You don't relent do you. This will be last post on this matter
>since I've already explained and demonstrated this remarkably simplistic
>concept to you several times already.
If by remarkably simplistic concept you mean stupid, inane and
completely wrong then I agree.
> madkevin wrote:
> > Actually, I would. That's my point. A cartoon is an animated movie. A
>documentary is
> > a movie. These are all movies. "Narrative" is a smaller subest of
>art, not the other
> > way around.
>
>That's all wrong. That's just in your opinion. Your still holding on to
>this belief you have without using any sources. You seem to believe that
>the word movie refers to *anything* that's a movable picture.
It does, Sizzlechest. Movies do not have to tell stories. They are not
limited by the narrative genre.
> The word
>has TWO definitions. The first is the original definition as defined
>circa 1912 as a short name for the new technology, the second is the
>evolved (read: updated) term which is what's used today. The news is not
>a motion picture by definition 2.
There is only one definition of movie and that's moving picture(motion
picture) Motion picture has two definitions:
1) A sequence of photographs or drawings projected on a screen in such
a rapid succession as to create the optical illusion of motion.
B). A story or play photographed as a motion picture.
So technically the news on TV is a motion picture, but that's not how
we normally use the word.
> > I would refer you to the excellent textbook "A History Of Narrative
>Film" by David
> > Cook for a more in-depth definition of what constitutes narrative
>cinema.
And narrative motion pictures do not constitute the total sum of
motion pictures.
>I've read it. Its on my shelf at home along with the equally fine "Lost
>Illusions". He doesn't contradict anything I've said.
Then he's wrong, too. ;-)
> Haven't you read
>it?
>
> > > Definition Number 2 refers to what we watch at the cinema. A
>connected
> > > cinematic narrative. A movie is the narrative form.
> >
> > I have seen a shortened version of Warhol's "Empire State" at a
>cinema. Ditto "Last
> > Of England" and "Blue", by Derek Jarman, which is not only
>non-narrative but doesn't
> > actually feature any images at all except for the same shade of blue
>exposed to each
> > frame of film. I have seen a number of purely abstract animated short
>films at a
> > cinema. These, and many more, are all considered movies.
>
>By who? You?
By the very defintion of the word, moron.
> Using Andy Warhol as an example here, whose movies consist
>of a 24 hour shot of the Empire State building, an eight hour movie of a
>guy asleep, a 35 minute movie of a guy getting a blow job, is a very
>tentative argument. You consider them movies yet Warhol's work has split
>critics all over the world. I've read much about Warhol and I've had the
>displeasure at seeing much of his work and never have I ever heard
>anybody (except for you today) refer to them as movies. Ever.
>
>I'll repeat. Film is the superset. Movie is the subset.
Film and movie are interchangeable words as they are used today- and
as they have been for a long time.
<Snip>
> > The term "movie" and "film" are interchangeable in relation to
>"motion pictures".
>
>*sigh*
>
>Again. No. Reason stated elsewhere.
Again, you- and whatever your source is- are dead wrong. One of the
defintions of the word "film" is motion picture. A motion picture is a
movie. Film = Motion Picture = Movie.
> > Actually, there are. There have been novels written on cards that
>come in a box,
> > where you shuffle the cards to produce prose poems.
>
>That's poetry. COMPLETELY DIFFERENT LITERARY GENRE. Sheesh.
And in the days of the Roman Empire a novel was a new law or
decree(usually used in plural form).
<snip>
>
>I'm scratching my head at that remark. Where was the personal attack.
>Read those paragraphs again. In the first I defended myself when you
>claimed I said something which I did not say. I then told you to read my
>posts more carefully. It was obvious you weren't, otherwise you wouldn't
>have made your original remark.
>
>In the second paragraph I said it would be nice if you did read my posts
>more carefully, followed by a statement that I gave you the same
>respect, and lastly a suggestion as to whether you deserved respect or
>not.
If you can't be bothered to actually use the definitions of words as
they appear in a dictionary then no one is going to give you any
respect.
>*sigh*. Why do I bother?
Dropped on your head too many times when you were a baby?
kentrel
> >I've read it. Its on my shelf at home along with the equally fine "Lost
> >Illusions". He doesn't contradict anything I've said.
>
> Then he's wrong, too. ;-)
If you believe that you know better than Cook then please tell me which
book you've written so that we all may be enlightened.
Regards
kentrel
> Scientists
> know very little about how the mind works during waking moments let
> alone while you are sleeping. And the sincere ones will tell you that
> up front.
So if scientists know so little what makes you so sure that I'm wrong? I
may be, I may not be. At least I presented an argument based on current
research and evidence, you just replied with your own inane opinions and
insults, which indicates the low watermark of your capabilities.
Regards
- kentrel
Lynn
Folco wrote:
>
> Oh, yes, does anyone have an interpretation of the fact that "Cookie"
> (Park Hotel's manager) is also Club Silencio's manager?
> [cut]
>
> Folco
I wondered about that as well... I was hoping to find him among the characters at the dinner party, but did
not see him. However, I've not seen anyone else talk about the very interesting character crossovers at the
singing audition scene. I notice that the1st auditioning girl who was very good and wanted the part more
than anything looks to me like the same actress as the waitress named Betty. Besides the obvious that Diane
had taken on the waitress' name for her idealized self in her dream, she also dreams the image of Betty as
as another idealized self-portrayal as someone much more qualified for and desirous of the part than
Camilla..(who is seen in that scene as the girl Camilla had kissed at the party). We later hear how much she
wanted that part during the party scene.
Also...any ideas where the Club Silencio singer's image is from? She looked a bit like the director's
wayward wife..anyone else?
Lastly, my TV screen isnt big enough to tell.... whose face is under that huge blue hair in Silencio's
balcony?
thanks.
blu...@megsinet.cutcaps.net
>
> Folco wrote:
> >
> > Oh, yes, does anyone have an interpretation of
> > the fact that "Cookie" (Park Hotel's manager) is
> > also Club Silencio's manager?
>
> him among the characters at the dinner party, but did
> not see him.
Lynn,
You know, I never gave the dual appearances of hotel manager Cookie
any thought until it was brought up here. Personally, I don't see
anything significant about his dual role. Unlike the other spilt
personalities of the movie-- split between a reality version later in
the film and a dream reincarnation in the earlier section-- Cookie's
roles are both in the dream section of the film. But why does he have
two jobs? This is Hollywood, baby. Everybody wants to break into show
business. So it's not surprising that a manager of a run-down motel
might moonlight (and mean MOONLIGHT-- this Club Silencio gig is going on
way past midnight) in a sparsely attended low-budget theater act. Kind
of like the grocery store manager you might see somewhere in a local
play.
> However, I've not seen anyone else talk about the
> very interesting character crossovers at the singing
> audition scene. I notice that the1st auditioning girl
> who was very good and wanted the part more than
> anything looks to me like the same actress as the
> waitress named Betty.
The waitress (both as Betty and as Diane) is played by Melissa
Crider. The first singer ("Sixteen Reasons") is named Carol and is
played by Elizabeth Lackey. I can see the resemblance, though,
especially given the quick glimpse we see of the waitress.
> Besides the obvious that Diane had taken on the
> waitress' name for her idealized self in her dream,
> she also dreams the image of Betty as as another
> idealized self-portrayal as someone much more
> qualified for and desirous of the part than Camilla..
>(who is seen in that scene as the girl Camilla had
> kissed at the party). We later hear how much she
> wanted that part during the party scene.
>
Yeah, the woman who kisses the real Camilla at the party-- who is
unnamed and perhaps even unknown to Diane-- is transformed in the dream
as the undeserving star Camilla of "The Sylvia North Story". Think
Diane has issues about losing that part? Yep. Clearly she sees herself
as the one with obvious talent who is cheated out by manipulative
Hollywood powerbrokers.
> Also...any ideas where the Club Silencio singer's
> image is from? She looked a bit like the director's
> wayward wife..anyone else?
The singer is introduced as Rebekah del Rio. That is her name in
real life. Despite her falling away as a recording goes on, that is
actually her voice on the recording (no hay banda, my ass). Adam's wife
is played by Lori Heuring (not to be confused with Rita/Camilla actress
Laura Harring).
> Lastly, my TV screen isnt big enough to tell....
> whose face is under that huge blue hair in Silencio's
> balcony?
Her name is Cori Glazer, a non-actress who was script supervisor on
"Mulholland Dr." and on four other Hollywood movies.
Jay
4/28/02
Smaug69
incoherently:
>"Richard ©ç® ²ºº²" wrote:
>>
>> I was going to say the same thing.
>>
>> He changes his argument mid-stream.
>
>> "Cook for a more in-depth definition of what constitutes narrative cinema."
>
>Actually, madkevin that said that. You moron. Think before you type.
Why didn't you follow your own advice?
Smaug69
incoherently:
>Smaug69 wrote:
>> Scientists
>> know very little about how the mind works during waking moments let
>> alone while you are sleeping. And the sincere ones will tell you that
>> up front.
>
>So if scientists know so little what makes you so sure that I'm wrong?
From reading the rest of your posts in this thread.
> I
>may be, I may not be. At least I presented an argument based on current
>research and evidence, you just replied with your own inane opinions and
>insults, which indicates the low watermark of your capabilities.
When scientists themselves tell me they don't really know all that
much about this stuff I'd say that's all the evidence I need.
Smaug69
incoherently:
>Smaug69 wrote:
>> >I've read it. Its on my shelf at home along with the equally fine "Lost
>> >Illusions". He doesn't contradict anything I've said.
>>
>> Then he's wrong, too. ;-)
>
>If you believe that you know better than Cook then please tell me which
>book you've written so that we all may be enlightened.
It's called common sense and common knowledge. Just 'cause somebody
wrote a book doesn't mean they know any better than me.
kentrel
> It's called common sense and common knowledge. Just 'cause somebody
> wrote a book doesn't mean they know any better than me.
That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. Do you read your posts
before you send them? Cook is a well respected author within the
industry. His research is exemplary, his writing is excellent. In case
anybody doubts his word he gives numerous sources for his material.
Common sense and common knowledge are irrelevant in this discussion
since neither are actually based on anything, and neither of them are
qualities you possess.
Regards
- kentrel
kentrel
Instead of simply glancing at my posts, looking for something to respond
to, why don't you read them properly and other people's as well? Maybe
then, you might be a little more aware of what the discussion is
actually about.
Making silly little nonsensical remarks like that only highlights your
own inadequacies.
Smaug69
Anyone who would purposely have lucid dreams about falling or not
being able to move needs serious help.
Smaug69(It's time for me to watch Dreamscape again)
*Philip*
> [snip]
> Those
> differences seem to suggest she's dreaming a fantastical story, and the
> random scenes Lynch's experimentation with dreams. i.e. dreams are often
> broken with random scenes that don't make sense. If you ignored those
> aspects of Mulholland Dr, yes you would be left with a story, but also,
> ignoring it removes most of the film. To me, that just doesn't qualify
> as a story.
> [snip]
Your opinion is that M Dr. is _mostly_ and purposely "random scenes that
don't make sense" because Lynch is experimenting with current scientific
theory on dreams being random neural firings.
Ok, I understand.
--
Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to
stick to possibilities; Truth isn't.
-Samuel Clemens
Smaug69
> Smaug69 wrote:
> >
>
> > From somewhere over there kentrel <ken...@mailandnews.com> mumbled
> > incoherently:
> >
>
> > >"Richard ??????" wrote:
> > >>
> > >> I was going to say the same thing.
> > >>
> > >> He changes his argument mid-stream.
>
> > >> "Cook for a more in-depth definition of what constitutes narrative c
> inema."
> > >
> > >Actually, madkevin that said that. You moron. Think before you type.
> >
>
> > Why didn't you follow your own advice?
>
> Instead of simply glancing at my posts, looking for something to respond
> to, why don't you read them properly and other people's as well? Maybe
> then, you might be a little more aware of what the discussion is
> actually about.
I know what it's about, Sparky.
> Making silly little nonsensical remarks like that only highlights your
> own inadequacies.
All I've seen in your posts are "silly nonsensical remarks."
SMaug69
Smaug69
> Smaug69 wrote:
> > It's called common sense and common knowledge. Just 'cause somebody
> > wrote a book doesn't mean they know any better than me.
>
> That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard.
Just how long have you been on Usenet?
> Do you read your posts
> before you send them?
Yup. Every time.
> Cook is a well respected author within the
> industry. His research is exemplary, his writing is excellent.
Opinions.
> In case
> anybody doubts his word he gives numerous sources for his material.
The number of sources presented is not nearly so important as their
reliablity and their accuracy.
> Common sense and common knowledge are irrelevant in this discussion
> since neither are actually based on anything, and neither of them are
> qualities you possess.
Film = Motion Picture = Movie
Movies/Films do not have to be narrative.
Mulholland Drive tells a story.
You seem to think that none of the above statements are true because
of what you read in Cook's book. I knew it without reading anyone's
book. That is what's called common sense and common knowledge. Think
for yourself, man. Don't be a sheep.
Smaug69(You don't have to be intelligent to write a book)
kentrel
>
> kentrel <cee...@mstore.CEE.hw.ac.uk> wrote in message news:<3CCD52D1...@mstore.CEE.hw.ac.uk>...
> > Smaug69 wrote:
> > > It's called common sense and common knowledge. Just 'cause somebody
> > > wrote a book doesn't mean they know any better than me.
> >
> > That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard.
>
> Just how long have you been on Usenet?
A long time, and have heard many stupid things, and that still ranks at
one of the stupidest things I've ever heard. Feel better?
> > In case
> > anybody doubts his word he gives numerous sources for his material.
>
> The number of sources presented is not nearly so important as their
> reliablity and their accuracy.
>
> > Common sense and common knowledge are irrelevant in this discussion
> > since neither are actually based on anything, and neither of them are
> > qualities you possess.
>
> Film = Motion Picture = Movie
>
> Movies/Films do not have to be narrative.
>
> Mulholland Drive tells a story.
>
> You seem to think that none of the above statements are true because
> of what you read in Cook's book.
You mentioned somewhere that you did read my posts. If you did actually
read them (and its clear you didn't) you would have known that I wasn't
the one who brought up this book. It was madkevin. I just agreed that it
was an excellent book. I hold my opinions not because of what I read in
just his book but what from studying numerous books, film,
autobiographies, critical analysis and watching thousands of films and
movies.
> I knew it without reading anyone's
> book. That is what's called common sense and common knowledge.
Common knowledge and common sense don't just appear out of nowhere. They
stem from life experience. Since my life has been film then I think I'm
in a better position to judge what's common knowledge within the
industry.
> You don't have to be intelligent to write a book)
You do if you want intelligent people to read it.
I'm beginning to feel like a parrot teaching pidgeons to talk here. Do
you really want to continue this nonsensical debate? Feel free, I've got
better things to do. This will be my final post. If you're interested in
this subject I suggest you go back and read the many posts in this
thread you didn't bother to read, and then go to your library and learn
about the industry.
ClckwrkO
>Common knowledge and common sense don't just appear out of nowhere. They
>stem from life experience. Since my life has been film then I think I'm
>in a better position to judge what's common knowledge within the
>industry.
Thank you "Mr. Spielberg".
ClckwrkO
Smaug69
<snip>
> > Just how long have you been on Usenet?
>
> A long time, and have heard many stupid things, and that still ranks at
> one of the stupidest things I've ever heard. Feel better?
Nothing gets by you, huh?
> > > In case
> > > anybody doubts his word he gives numerous sources for his material.
> >
> > The number of sources presented is not nearly so important as their
> > reliablity and their accuracy.
> >
> > > Common sense and common knowledge are irrelevant in this discussion
> > > since neither are actually based on anything, and neither of them are
> > > qualities you possess.
> >
> > Film = Motion Picture = Movie
> >
> > Movies/Films do not have to be narrative.
> >
> > Mulholland Drive tells a story.
> >
> > You seem to think that none of the above statements are true because
> > of what you read in Cook's book.
>
> You mentioned somewhere that you did read my posts. If you did actually
> read them (and its clear you didn't) you would have known that I wasn't
> the one who brought up this book. It was madkevin.
It doesn't matter who brought it up. You referred to it in making some
of your points.
> I just agreed that it
> was an excellent book. I hold my opinions not because of what I read in
> just his book but what from studying numerous books, film,
> autobiographies, critical analysis and watching thousands of films and
> movies.
And yet you can't be bothered to pick up a dictionary.
> > I knew it without reading anyone's
> > book. That is what's called common sense and common knowledge.
>
> Common knowledge and common sense don't just appear out of nowhere. They
> stem from life experience.
And you can't just pick up a book or watch a movie to get them either.
> Since my life has been film then I think I'm
> in a better position to judge what's common knowledge within the
> industry.
LOL! Common sense in Hollywood? That's just too funny.
> > You don't have to be intelligent to write a book)
>
> You do if you want intelligent people to read it.
>
> I'm beginning to feel like a parrot teaching pidgeons
Where's that dictionary when you need it?
> to talk here. Do
> you really want to continue this nonsensical debate? Feel free, I've got
> better things to do. This will be my final post. If you're interested in
> this subject I suggest you go back and read the many posts in this
> thread you didn't bother to read, and then go to your library and learn
> about the industry.
For someone who's spent alot of time "learning" about the industry you
certainly don't show it.
Smaug69
C.N.
sma...@my-deja.com (Smaug69) wrote an awful lot of bullshit in
message news:<aa8ccb68.02050...@posting.google.com>...
> kentrel <ken...@mailandnews.com> wrote in message news:<3CCEB38C...@mailandnews.com>...
>
> <snip>
>
> > > Just how long have you been on Usenet?
> >
> > A long time, and have heard many stupid things, and that still ranks at
> > one of the stupidest things I've ever heard. Feel better?
>
> Nothing gets by you, huh?
You're a classic last word freak. lol.
> > I just agreed that it
> > was an excellent book. I hold my opinions not because of what I read in
> > just his book but what from studying numerous books, film,
> > autobiographies, critical analysis and watching thousands of films and
> > movies.
>
> And yet you can't be bothered to pick up a dictionary.
Wasn't the original post was that kentrall was saying that nobody else
was using a dictionary, and making their own definitions of words up,
and only now you're agreeing with him?
> > to talk here. Do
> > you really want to continue this nonsensical debate? Feel free, I've got
> > better things to do. This will be my final post. If you're interested in
> > this subject I suggest you go back and read the many posts in this
> > thread you didn't bother to read, and then go to your library and learn
> > about the industry.
>
> For someone who's spent alot of time "learning" about the industry you
> certainly don't show it.
Well neither of you know much about the industry but smaug you're just
arguing for the sake of it and making no sense either. kenttrel made
some good points, i dont agree with them, but he backed them up well,
but you - you're just full of hot air.
later, C.H.
C.N.
JoeS <me....@gte.net> wrote in message news:<3CC835DF...@gte.net>...
> That you believe dreams are random nonsense is revealing of your flawed
> perspective.
Hey, I dreamed David Lynch won an Oscar. If that's not nonsense I
don't know what is! :)
later, C.H.
Bill Savage
about a girl from the Midwest(Betty) who comes to L.A. with hopes and
dreams of making it big in Hollywood, but commits suicide because her
plans don't work out as scheduled. The film is her life flashing
before her eyes from the instant the bullet enters her head to the
time her head hits the pillow.
-Bill
Smaug69
<snip>
> > Nothing gets by you, huh?
>
> You're a classic last word freak. lol.
Nothing gets by you, huh? :-)
> > > I just agreed that it
> > > was an excellent book. I hold my opinions not because of what I read in
> > > just his book but what from studying numerous books, film,
> > > autobiographies, critical analysis and watching thousands of films and
> > > movies.
> >
> > And yet you can't be bothered to pick up a dictionary.
>
> Wasn't the original post was that kentrall was saying that nobody else
> was using a dictionary, and making their own definitions of words up,
> and only now you're agreeing with him?
No, I was just pointing out that he was the pot calling the kettle
black.
> > > to talk here. Do
> > > you really want to continue this nonsensical debate? Feel free, I've got
> > > better things to do. This will be my final post. If you're interested in
> > > this subject I suggest you go back and read the many posts in this
> > > thread you didn't bother to read, and then go to your library and learn
> > > about the industry.
> >
> > For someone who's spent alot of time "learning" about the industry you
> > certainly don't show it.
>
> Well neither of you know much about the industry but smaug you're just
> arguing for the sake of it and making no sense either.
Who put the itchy in the whatchy?
> kenttrel made
> some good points, i dont agree with them, but he backed them up well,
That is a matter of opinion. I don't think he made any good points and
most of the other posters in the thread seem to agree.
> but you - you're just full of hot air.
Damn! Found out again. Time to move on.
Smaug69(Using hot air to float away to another thread)
JerryD
That seems to both sum up the importance of the movie, and contradict
many of its details....so it's probably a pretty good summary of a Lynch
film. :)