Blue Velvet (1986)Story and Direction: David Lynch
My impressionable young mind used to wonder when I used to read of random shootings in schools and somewhat bizarre behaviours of certain people in the so-called civilised world. I thought the deviant acts were the price one paid for development. The phenomenon of adolescent psychology was not even an entity in this part of the world till about 20 years ago. Is it a first world problem as we set different priorities as our target and different role models to follow? Perhaps this film, another David Lynch classic, is trying to tell us that the dangers were lurking inside all the while. It is just that avenues are available to express now. It had just been swept under the proverbial carpet all this while.
It starts on an idyllic day in the 60s on a sunny day with everybody smiling and Bobby V's 'Blue Velvet' song in the background. A man is watering his lawn, and his family members are drawn to a TV series. The man is suddenly paralysed with a stroke. The camera shows him falling on the ground, the water from the hose goes all over the place, and it zooms down into the ground. Way down, showing bugs chewing on dead tissues and soil. That, in essence, is the message behind the story. Many unpleasant thoughts go deep in the minds of seeming perfect people.
The college son of the stroke returns home to mind the business. He discovers a piece of a severed human ear while walking through a short-cut to the hospital. He brings it to the police. He decides to be a 'Hardy Boy' kind of private investigator to unveil a web of kidnapping, blackmail, forbidden love, fetishes, masochistic love and a lesson in Freudian psychological development.
There are a lot of unnecessary displays of what would make members of the guardian of morality hot under the collar and symbolisms to prove the storyteller's point of view. Not everything that appears ascetically appealing is what it seems. Look at the dove. The dove, the symbol of peace and harmony, can also be destructive to survive. It swallows a bug whole while it is still alive. To the bug, a dove is a monster that draws the life out of down. It is anything but a sign of bliss!
The college son of the stroke returns home to mind the business. He discovers a piece of a severed human ear while walking through a short-cut to the hospital. He brings it to the police. He decides to be a 'Hardy Boy' kind of private investigator to unveil a web of kidnapping, blackmail, forbidden love, fetishes, masochistic love and a lesson in Freudian psychological development.
There are a lot of unnecessary displays of what would make members of the guardian of morality hot under the collar and symbolisms to prove the storyteller's point of view. Not everything that appears ascetically appealing is what it seems. Look at the dove. The dove, the symbol of peace and harmony, can also be destructive to survive. It swallows a bug whole while it is still alive. To the bug, a dove is a monster that draws the life out of down. It is anything but a sign of bliss!
Comments
Post a Comment