A mind-bending film which makes you work

Rating: 10/10 (4 August 2014)

'Mulholland Drive' is a classic, but that doesn't mean it'll be enjoyed by everyone. If you like your stories easy to follow and getting from point A to point B in a straight line, then you probably have never watched anything by David Lynch. He specialises in creating teasing, disconcerting vibes and films based on feeling and mood, rather than linier storytelling.
Mulholland Drive is a dark mystery about a young girl who arrives in Hollywood to pursue her dream of being an actress, only to get caught up with another young woman who has lost her memory and has a murky past which slowly gets unravelled.
If you're familiar with Lynch's work, you may have seen his previous film 'Lost Highway.' It wasn't as well received as this one. It was - although visually stunning and darkly odd - not easy to follow. David Lynch creates films that are, to a certain degree, about what you feel, rather than just telling a story. He freely admits that Lost Highway was about a 50/50 split of feelings and storytelling. This made it a lot harder to follow as a narrative. However, Mulholland Drive is a little easier - it's about 85% story and 15% feeling, making 1 hour and 52 minutes of it pretty easy to watch.
Then you have 'the big change.' The last 20 minutes are the film's 'pay-off' and you will either love it for showing you what you've spent nearly two hours watching, or hate it for 'cheating' you.
If you're thinking of watching some of David Lynch's work, Mulholland Drive is a reasonable place to start. It's a basic mystery story which is - relatively - easy to follow. If you like it, try Lost Highway, or even Inland Empire (which is the hardest of all his films to try and decode, based on it being about 80% feeling and only 20% story). Just be warned, all of Lynch's work is pretty dark, often violent and pretty sexually explicit.
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