Hi,

My first post here...

Mulholland Drive is one of - if not - my favourite movies. Going through most of Lynch's work, I find this his best next to Twin Peaks. Anyway,

The scene where Betty is dropped off in LA - Why are the two old people laughing in the Limo? I don't really understand them. They also appear in a bag near the end of the movie. I pretty much understand the rest of the film in my own way, but this baffles me at the moment!

FilmFoo wrote:Hi,

My first post here...

Mulholland Drive is one of - if not - my favourite movies. Going through most of Lynch's work, I find this his best next to Twin Peaks. Anyway,

The scene where Betty is dropped off in LA - Why are the two old people laughing in the Limo? I don't really understand them. They also appear in a bag near the end of the movie. I pretty much understand the rest of the film in my own way, but this baffles me at the moment!

Welcome aboard Filmfoo!

It's really quite open to interpretation as much is in MD. But, since you are a Twin Peaks fan ...


Regardless, it certainly is a 'what-the-heck' kind of moment.

Welcome indeed.

I've always thought that this scene was intended to show that they know something Betty doesn't, and they're having a laugh at her. Perhaps that they know how this story is going to play out and the laugh is at Betty's naivety.

Irene: I'll be watching for you on the big screen
Betty: Won't that be the day ...

Cue mockery and laughter in the limo.

Others have found a kind of caring element to Irene and her companion. I have to say that I never got that at all. The limo scene to me just exposes the niceties that went before it as fraudulent. The only other thing that I came up with on this is that I was reading through one of those dream explanation books one time, and came across the "Teeth" entry, which said:

Teeth:
A broad, almost menacing display of teeth may advise a degree of caution in embracing someone who is making overtures of friendship.

Dream explanations and analysis are ten a penny, but I do wonder if somehow that explanation is related to the Little Red Riding Hood Story.

Anyway, could be unrelated?

Thanks for the welcome :)

I thought that the scene between Irene and Betty was intentionally cheesy. Maybe i'm just being weird, but it seems like it was taken from an actual film. The lines also seem quite odd in comparison to the rest of the film. Your idea of them laughing at her seems to fit in perfectly with that, to me, anyway lol


Also just pointing out, Adam makes a similar teeth baring smile when he's in the car on a journey to meet the cowboy. Don't know if they could be related somehow?

Cheesy. Nice word that fits the scenes perfectly.

It's as if someone said "Say 'cheese'!" and they got those 'cheesy' smiles.

FilmFoo wrote:Thanks for the welcome :)

I thought that the scene between Irene and Betty was intentionally cheesy. Maybe i'm just being weird, but it seems like it was taken from an actual film. The lines also seem quite odd in comparison to the rest of the film. Your idea of them laughing at her seems to fit in perfectly with that, to me, anyway lol

I get the same vibe. It's like the dialogue was lifted from some old corny movie.

Its funny, I have always seen Irene and companion as Betty/Diane/Ruth's parents and are the manifestation of her guilt at having failed at life. Disappointing your parents is something few would want to do and fear of facing that disappointment could become a persons hell on earth. They are shown in a sort of overexposed film "memory" smiling with "Betty" during the applause of the jitterbug dancing so I thought of them as representing her parents who return to haunt her in her failed life. That they "traveled" together and hoped to see her on the big screen seems plausable. The forced cheesy smiling was their pretension at pretending to accept her life and how phoney they might act towards each other. As representations of her parents it also fits with the screams of a little girl some have heard when they are chasing her through her apartment. When they emerge from the blue box (of blues) they escape from her subconcious to crawl in and torment her. Her past?

Edit 24Jan11: I have been trying to get my thoughts togeher on the film after rethinking my original interpretation from many years ago. I ow consider Irene to actually represent Coco/Camilla/Rita's now older repressed guilt and other "companion" guilts which one accumulates during their lifetimes and invade your life though you make efforts to keep them out.

FilmFoo wrote:The scene where Betty is dropped off in LA - Why are the two old people laughing in the Limo? I don't really understand them. They also appear in a bag near the end of the movie. I pretty much understand the rest of the film in my own way, but this baffles me at the moment!

Well, there's obviously something sinister about what is going on. Why was 'Betty' called into the movie at that point?

Oldgoldtop wrote:Its funny, I have always seen Irene and companion as Betty/Diane/Ruth's parents and are the manifestation of her guilt at having failed at life. Disappointing your parents is something few would want to do and fear of facing that disappointment could become a persons hell on earth. They are shown in a sort of overexposed film "memory" smiling with "Betty" during the applause of the jitterbug dancing so I thought of them as representing her parents who return to haunt her in her failed life. That they "traveled" together and hoped to see her on the big screen seems plausable. The forced cheesy smiling was their pretension at pretending to accept her life and how phoney they might act towards each other. As representations of her parents it also fits with the screams of a little girl some have heard when they are chasing her through her apartment. When they emerge from the blue box (of blues) they escape from her subconcious to crawl in and torment her. Her past?

This is exactly my interpretation/explanation of the limo scene. They are Diane's parents, manifestations of her guilty conscience, her failure as an actress.

In a one of the last scenes, there is this dinner at the house of Coco. In a similar way, you can see Adam Kesher and Rita laughing at each other.

I think that the elderly-scene is a dreamlike remembrance of the dinner-scene.

Interesting idea!