Ultimately, it's an old story... but with a twist.

Rating: Null/10 (18 February 2002)

*** Big Time Spoiler Stuff going on down here*** * * *
Symbols, figurative language, relative perspective, and juxtapostion. It's all there, in this very heavy, psychological thriller. It is a tough nut to crack.
I believe that the Mullholand Drive story is of a lover's triangle with tragic consequences. But, most of the time of the actual movie is spent on a fantasy contrived in the the mind of a mentally disturbed, young actress on her death bed. The big crescendo, is when the fantasy clashes with reality. But, instead of a crescendo, the director wants us to be quiet (silencio).
I think Lynch is suggesting or at least asking, in the film, what if imagined characters, or altermate, fractered personalites of a wounded soul have an essentially discrete existance all their own, too? Like spirits. Can it be true? He's saying it is true. And that's it's no big deal, either. It only looks weird to *us* (For those of us who remember Harry Nilsson's The Point, Oblio was tought by the Rockman, that "you see what you want to see, and you hear what you want to hear." Essentially, this is what the MC in the club is stating, and what the mind of our forelorn protagonist is realizing as she lay dying.)
I suspect that film students will be compiling material for many-a term papers to come from of this delightful movie, as their are so many possible themes swirling throughout the piece, that to describe all of possiblities in one sitting would be a formitable challenge.
I wish you happy, patient viewing.