Tagged: Directed by David Lynch
Wild at Heart: Nicolas Cage’s Snakeskin Jacket as Sailor Ripley
Nicolas Cage as Sailor Ripley in Wild at Heart (1990)
Vitals
Nicolas Cage as Sailor Ripley, an A #1-certified manslaughterer who just broke parole
Cape Fear to Texas via New Orleans, Fall 1989
Film: Wild at Heart
Release Date: August 17, 1990
Director: David Lynch
Costume Designer: Amy Stofsky
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
This week continues to explore unconventional style from David Lynch movies with a long-overdue look at Nic Cage’s snakeskin jacket as the swaggering Sailor Ripley in Wild at Heart, Lynch’s darkly comic adaptation of Barry Gifford’s 1989 novel of the same name. The film premiered at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival where it garnered some controversy for winning the Palme d’Or, three months prior to its wider North American release in August 1990.
Specifically considered for the role after Lynch read Gifford’s novel, Cage described Sailor as “a kind of romantic Southern outlaw,” reunited with his girlfriend Lula Fortune (Laura Dern) after spending 22 months and 18 days in the Pee Dee Correctional Institution for fatally defending himself—and Lula’s honor—against an attacker hired by Lula’s domineering mama Marietta (Dern’s real-life mother Diane Ladd) after Sailor spurned her drunken advances. Two years has done little to dampen Marietta’s dislike for Sailor, who again sends paid killers on Sailor’s trail as he and Lula flee Cape Fear on their way west to sunny California. Continue reading
Blue Velvet: Dennis Hopper’s Black Leather Jacket and Bolo Tie as Frank Booth
Dennis Hopper on the set of Blue Velvet (1986). Photo credit: Jim Bridges.
Vitals
Dennis Hopper as Frank Booth, sadistic drug dealer
Lumberton, North Carolina, Spring 1985
Film: Blue Velvet
Release Date: September 19, 1986
Director: David Lynch
Costumer: Ronald Leamon
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
After his early low-budget debut Eraserhead (1977) and adaptations The Elephant Man (1980) and Dune (1984), David Lynch finally unleashed many of his cinematic signatures when the neo-noir thriller Blue Velvet premiered forty years ago today during the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), one week before its wider release.
Blue Velvet‘s themes of disturbing violence and surreal absurdism among a neo-nostalgic Americana backdrop became Lynchian trademarks, as well as his cast of frequent collaborators like Laura Dern, Kyle MacLachlan, Jack Nance, and Isabella Rossellini. The movie also revitalized Dennis Hopper’s stalled career through his explosive, Golden Globe-winning performance as the chilling criminal Frank Booth—a psychopathic, amyl nitrate-addicted Roy Orbison fan with serious mommy issues. Continue reading
Blue Velvet: Kyle MacLachlan’s Black Jacket
Kyle MacLachlan in Blue Velvet (1986)
Vitals
Kyle MacLachlan as Jeffrey Beaumont, inquisitive college student
Lumberton, North Carolina, Spring 1985
Film: Blue Velvet
Release Date: September 19, 1986
Director: David Lynch
Costumer: Ronald Leamon
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
Today marks the 66th birthday of Kyle MacLachlan, star of the late David Lynch’s neo-noir thriller Blue Velvet. Lynch and “Kale” had first collaborated two years earlier for the director’s adaptation of Frank Herbert’s Dune, which was met with poor reception. Undeterred, Lynch shifted direction with Blue Velvet, a more personal project that delved into his now-familiar themes of surrealism and the dark, oft-criminal underbelly of Americana.
MacLachlan stars as Jeffrey Beaumont, a college student who returns to his hometown of Lumberton, North Carolina to help his family following his father’s heart attack. Taking a secluded shortcut to his parents’ home after a hospital visit, Jeffrey discovers a severed ear in a vacant field… launching him into a dangerous conspiracy involving a sultry lounge singer and a sadistic gangster. Continue reading
Richard Farnsworth in The Straight Story
Richard Farnsworth as Alvin Straight in The Straight Story (1999)
Vitals
Richard Farnsworth as Alvin Straight, septuagenarian retiree
Across the Midwest from Iowa to Wisconsin, Fall 1994
Film: The Straight Story
Release Date: October 15, 1999
Director: David Lynch
Costume Designer: Patricia Norris
Background
Perhaps the most accessible and mainstream entry in David Lynch’s electric filmography (and the only one to be rated G), The Straight Story was released 25 years ago this week on October 15, 1999. The film depicts the real-life journey undertaken by Alvin Straight, a retired laborer who rode a lawn mower for 240 miles from Laurens, Iowa to Mount Zion, Wisconsin to visit and make amends with his ailing older brother after the latter’s stroke.
Born 104 years ago today on October 17, 1920, Alvin Straight had served in the U.S. Army during World War II and the Korean War, but diabetes and emphysema had taken their toll on his health over the following decades to the point where he couldn’t see well enough to receive a driver’s license. Undeterred, the 73-year-old widower set out eastward in July 1994 on an old John Deere riding mower with a homemade trailer in tow, sticking to highway shoulders and side roads at a top speed of five miles per hour. Continue reading
You must be logged in to post a comment.