Synopsis
"After the failure of the epic sci-fi
Dune that nearly ended
Lynch’s career, he resolved to make a personal film, and ultimately settled on what would become his undisputed masterpiece of the 1980s,
Blue Velvet. After finding a severed human ear in a field, Jeffrey Beaumont (
Kyle MacLachlan) discovers, beneath his idyllic suburban hometown, a sinister underworld inhabited by damaged mystery lady Dorothy Vallens (
Isabella Rossellini) and her sadistic captor, Frank Booth (
Dennis Hopper). The intense color palette, lush Old Hollywood orchestral score, and anachronistic flourishes inch
Blue Velvet just past the realm of realism into a space without signposts that gets more disorienting the longer you stay in it. Upon its release,
Blue Velvet became an instant cult film and, as more people saw it, a lightning rod for polarized reactions." – Film Society of Lincoln Centre