Blue Velvet (film)

Blue Velvet
Theatrical release poster
Directed byDavid Lynch
Written byDavid Lynch
Produced byFred Caruso
Starring
CinematographyFrederick Elmes
Edited byDuwayne Dunham
Music byAngelo Badalamenti
Distributed byDe Laurentiis Entertainment Group
Release dates
  • September 12, 1986 (1986-09-12) (Toronto)
  • September 19, 1986 (1986-09-19) (United States)
Running time
120 minutes[1]
CountryUnited States
Budget$6 million[2]
Box office$8.6 million (North America)[2][3]

Blue Velvet is a 1986 American neo-noir mystery thriller film written and directed by David Lynch. Blending psychological horror[4][5] with film noir, the film stars Kyle MacLachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper, and Laura Dern, and is named after the 1951 song of the same name. The film concerns a young college student who, returning home to visit his ill father, discovers a severed human ear in a field. The ear then leads him to uncover a vast criminal conspiracy and enter into a romantic relationship with a troubled lounge singer.

The screenplay of Blue Velvet had been passed around multiple times in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with several major studios declining it due to its strong sexual and violent content.[6]: 126  After the failure of his 1984 film Dune, Lynch made attempts at developing a more "personal story", somewhat characteristic of the surrealist style displayed in his first film Eraserhead (1977). The independent studio De Laurentiis Entertainment Group, owned at the time by Italian film producer Dino De Laurentiis, agreed to finance and produce the film.

Blue Velvet initially received a divided critical response,[7] with many stating that its explicit content served little artistic purpose. Nevertheless, the film earned Lynch his second nomination for the Academy Award for Best Director, and received the year's Best Film and Best Director prizes from the National Society of Film Critics. It came to achieve cult status. As an example of a director casting against the norm, it was credited for revitalizing Hopper's career and for providing Rossellini with a dramatic outlet beyond her previous work as a fashion model and a cosmetics spokeswoman. In the years since, the film has been re-evaluated, and it is now widely regarded as one of Lynch's major works[8] and one of the greatest films of the 1980s.[9][10] Publications including Sight & Sound, Time, Entertainment Weekly and BBC Magazine have ranked it among the greatest American films ever.[11] In 2008, it was chosen by the American Film Institute as one of the ten greatest American mystery films.

  1. ^ "BLUE VELVET". British Board of Film Classification. Archived from the original on January 14, 2015. Retrieved January 14, 2015.
  2. ^ a b "Blue Velvet (1986)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved January 14, 2015.
  3. ^ De Laurentiis PRODUCER'S PICTURE DARKENS: KNOEDELSEDER, WILLIAM K, Jr. Los Angeles Times August 30, 1987: 1.
  4. ^ "25 Most Disturbing Movies". gamesradar.com. Retrieved August 2, 2015.
  5. ^ "25 Best Horror Movies Since The Shining". Vulture.com. October 25, 2013. Archived from the original on July 16, 2015. Retrieved August 2, 2015.
  6. ^ Lynch, David (March 24, 2005). Chris Rodley (ed.). Lynch on Lynch. New York City: Faber & Faber. ISBN 978-0-571-22018-2.
  7. ^ Ebert, Roger (October 2, 1986). "My Problem with 'Blue Velvet'". Retrieved January 4, 2017. "... with his latest movie, 'Blue Velvet,' [Lynch] finds himself at the center of a national critical firestorm."
  8. ^ "David Lynch's Acclaimed Films". They Shoot Pictures, Don't They. Archived from the original on January 15, 2017. Retrieved November 3, 2016.
  9. ^ "Blue Velvet (1986)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved June 17, 2007.
  10. ^ Malcolm, Derek (February 17, 2000). "David Lynch: Blue Velvet". The Guardian. Retrieved November 3, 2016.
  11. ^ "The 100 greatest American films". BBC. July 2015. Archived from the original on September 16, 2016. Retrieved August 2, 2015.