No Blue Velvet but still a Lynch movie

Rating: 6/10 (10 January 2006)

Mulholland Drive has a very surreal structure which is the central part of the movie. If you like the surreal narration of David Lynch and aren't too afraid of mediocre acting, you might like this movie, because that's what Mulholland Drive's mystery is all about: Who's who and how are the different situations related.
There is something in Mulholland Drive that gives all the madness some kind of logical meaning; but first of all it makes you more distanced from the actions in the movie contrary to Blue Velvet which was surreal, too, but still very serious, near and frightening, since in Mulholland Drive it's all some kind of hazy dream; and second I'm personally not too fond of movies that MUST have some kind of meaning to it. If you hated Videodrome because it was too confusing and it didn't make sense, you might like Mulholland Drive where the craziness make sense and don't pull you too much into the story.
Mulholland Drive is definitely a Hollywood movie with Hollywood actors but it tries to move away from the Hollywoodness by having a critical view on Hollywood movie making, but in my opinion Mulholland Drive doesn't succeed in this the way for example Adaptation does; mainly because of Naomi Watts and Laura Harring. The selection of actors has a Lynchian kind of irony to it but in Mulholland Drive it is far too obvious.
If you are mostly in to very mainstream movies, Mulholland Drive might be a nice change which still isn't too hard to digest, but if you are mostly in to movies that are a bit more crazy, this might be too mainstream.
Mulholland Drive isn't too bad if you take it for what it is: A light version of a David Lynch movie, but personally this movie just makes me like Blue Velvet much more, since it reveals all the mistakes Lynch avoided making in that movie.
6/10