Adventures of a Jitterbug!

Rating: 10/10 (22 January 2003)

I love this movie! From some of the reviews I'd read beforehand I expected it to be a difficult movie (despite being a fan of Lynch) but I really enjoyed it on first viewing and watching it again reveals new things easily missed before. It's right up there with David Lynch at his finest. The two beautiful female leads both do a wonderful job of separating their dual identities in the movie. Naomi Watts as Betty is amusingly all "Gosh, gee! This is superfun!" through much of the film but gets to show her acting chops in the scene where Betty is auditioning for an acting role and later in the film when she becomes Diane, a tragic victim of unrequited love and guilt in the Boulevard Of Broken Dreams. Laura Elena Harring is frightened and helpless as Rita but as Carmilla, she becomes more confident and hard edged. Justin Theroux kind of reminds me of Bruce Campbell in his role as a director and it's great to see "Twin Peaks" star Michael J Anderson appear in the movie.
There's lots of great scenes in the movie including the aforementioned audition, Theroux's meeting with "The Cowboy" (note the use of electricity in this scene, a familiar motif from David Lynch's other work), the hitman's first scene which reminds me of both Quentin Tarantino and the Coen brothers, the erotic love scene between Betty and Rita which is tender and is there to do more than titillate we male viewers
and the surreal and touching scene in the Silencio club.
It's great that David Lynch was able to turn his passed over tv pilot into a masterpiece of cinema with his familiar elements. Even by the time we get to the Pandora's Box cliffhanging ending of the pilot, we've been on quite a journey with the two girls, but the second part of the movie is just as interesting in it's way in showing an even darker side of trying to live in the Hollywood illusion. A great exploration of dreams vs reality and the consequences of guilt. Often amusing, mysterious, erotic, touching and heartwrenching in it's final revelations. This film is red hot!