Blue Velvet is a 1986 American mystery film, written and directed by David Lynch, exhibiting elements of both film noir and surrealism. The film features Kyle Maclachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper, and Laura Dern. The title is taken from the 1963 Bobby Vinton song of the same name. Although initially detested by some mainstream critics, the film is now widely acclaimed, and earned Lynch his second Academy Award nomination for Best Director. As an example of a director casting against the norm, Blue Velvet is also noted for re-launching Hopper's career and for providing Rossellini with a dramatic outlet beyond the work as a fashion model and a cosmetics spokeswoman for which she had until then been known.
The film centers on college student Jeffrey Beaumont (Maclachlan), who, returning from visiting his ill father in the hospital, comes across a human ear in a field in his hometown of Lumberton. He proceeds to investigate the ear with help from a high school student, Sandy Williams (Dern), who provides him with information and leads from her father, a local police detective. Jeffrey's investigation draws him deeper into his hometown's seedy underworld, and sees him forming a sexual relationship with the alluring torch singer, Dorothy Vallens (Rossellini), and uncovering criminal Frank Booth (Hopper), who engages in drug abuse and sexual violence.
Upon watching this film I was struck with awe at the surrealistic qualities that resound throughout the film and in fact throught the entire body of David Lynch's work. David Lynch is a film maker that I greatly admire. His work embodies wonderful and at the same time disturbing tales of the seedy, underside of American towns with perplexing, non-linear narratives and interjecting plot lines.
The aspect of David Lynch's work that I am looking to incorporate into my own is of a series of sequences that permits the ending to be open to the viewers interpretation.
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