David Lynch peeks behind the picket fences of small-town America to reveal a corrupt shadow world of malevolence, sadism and madness.
From the opening shots Lynch turns the Technicolor picture postcard images of middle-class homes into a dreamy vision on the edge of nightmare. College boy Kyle MacLachlan (Jeffrey) returns home and stumbles across a severed human ear in a vacant lot. With the help of a sweetly innocent high school girl (Laura Dern), he turns junior detective and uncovers a frightening yet darkly compelling world of voyeurism and sex. Drawn deeper into the brutal world of drug dealer and blackmailer Frank, played with raving mania by an obscenity-shouting Dennis Hopper, Jeffrey loses his innocence and his moral bearings when confronted with pure, unexplainable evil. Isabella Rossellini is terrifyingly desperate as Hopper's sexual slave who becomes MacLachlan's illicit lover and Dean Stockwell purrs through his role. David Lynch delivers a nightmarish masterpiece.
USA 1986 David Lynch 120m
