Blue Velvet (1986)

Second viewing; first viewed on June 14, 1987.

A young man returning to his hometown during his father's illness gets entangled in a criminal case which he decides to investigate on his own, with some help from the police detective's daughter.

A much talked about movie which does not deliver as much as its reputation would make one expect.  I saw in it mostly a moderately amusing parody of adolescent films of the late fifties and early sixties. The one I can summon without much mental effort is The Blob, but I am sure there are others. It is uncertain whether a finer analysis of the film as a social critique (or as anything else, for that matter) would be a rewarding enterprise. I confess to not understanding exactly why I felt so averse to it on my first viewing. I could not find my earlier notes about it, but I remember being annoyed by what I considered to be the filmmaker's simple-mindedness. I was in error, perhaps, as now I see this simple-mindedness as rather the object of the filmmaker's critique. My present objection is to the film's inconsequentiality.

Rating: 47 (up from 30)