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But David Lynch's Mulholland Drive isn't bound for blockbusting. It's for those who want a challenge, and especially for those who enjoy David Lynch's maze-like, nonlinear storytelling, which is usually rife with villainy and unhappy surprises. Lynch developed Mulholland Drive as a television series, but the studio pulled the plug. Lynch fans feared the work would be buried forever, until the director announced he would re-edit it, condense it, film a new ending, and release it as a movie. How could he condense 13 hours into two and have it make sense? Lynch's characteristic response would be, Who says it needs to make sense?

Drive seems right in step with the director's repeated exploration of evils that reside beneath the surface of America's shiny, happy goodness. Lynch may well be on a mission to prove there is no such thing as an incorruptible American dream. While his stories tend to unearth sights too grisly for most moviegoers, Lynch, like Dante with his Divine Comedy, illustrates various levels of hell to point to the flaws in our human nature. He takes the celebrated American dreams and peels them open to show the ugly base appetites that "drive" them.

Mulholland Drive is a dream. I'm not spoiling the surprise: the film opens by zooming in slowly on a big red pillow. What follows seems a traditional linear story, at first. Betty (Naomi Watts), a young perky blonde, follows her dreams to Hollywood. She says she wants to be a serious actress, but the monster behind her Barbie grin slowly emerges—she's willing to compromise more than just her integrity in order to be a star. Her appetite for fame is voracious, and when she loses a big leading role to another actress, jealousy rushes her down the slippery slope toward hate and madness.

This is only clear in retrospect. Along the way, Betty finds a brunette bombshell (Laura Elena Harring) hiding in the shower in her apartment. This bruised, bloodied beauty has lost her memory and her name in a terrible car accident. She borrows the name "Rita" and accepts Betty's help in a search for her lost identity. The New Yorker's Anthony Lane describes these two heroines perfectly: "To see Betty … gasp with girlish anticipation at the treasures of Hollywood is like watching Fay Wray setting off for an island vacation," but meanwhile, "All [Rita] has left, like Mulholland Drive, is a full set of curves."

In the traumatic events that follow, Betty and Rita are transformed from determined Nancy Drews into desperate lovers. What draws them into this rash and reckless affair? Perhaps Betty envies Rita's Hollywood connections. Perhaps Rita yearns for Betty's naiveté and "innocence." The further they descend into the maddeningly surreal hell of Hollywood, the more Betty loses her grip on herself, giving way to selfish, wicked desires. Suddenly, the story itself loses its identity, and its name changes from Mulholland Drive (the avenue) to Mulholland Drive (a dangerous compulsion). Scenes blur and get mixed up. Flashbacks begin—sometimes the same, sometimes different. And some characters morph—there's no better way to say it—into other characters. At the end, we're in territory as symbolic and irrational as a Fellini film (which Lynch clearly knows and even references).

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October (Web-only) 2001, Vol. 45