Betty and so-called "Rita" arrive at SB and look at the board with the resident names. After Rita's scare, they begin walking down a path and it cuts to a POV shot that eventually shows this:
It's an apt with a screen door and an ugly bare tree.

They continue walking. We get the close-up of their walking feet to emphasize it.

This is where things first start getting weird and inconsistent.


^Note where the grass is and where the hedge wall is in relation to the direction of their feet.
After this shot, it cuts to this POV:

Which is weird... it's showing the opposite direction they're walking, and the POV isn't moving forward, it just looks from left to right. That is weird, is it not? It's inconsistent and begins to disorient the viewer. Don't believe me? Right after this we get a much bigger and obvious example.

Now pay attention this is the most important part of the post:

B&R finally arrive here:

We see them in that shot^ as they begin walking toward the screen, then it cuts to a POV showing the front of #12. But now when it cuts to show B&R again, check this out:
Not kidding you! This is literally what the film cuts to, but nobody even notices it.

DO YOU SEE?

Before Betty and Rita arrive at #12 we see a cutscene of them arriving at #17!--something we haven't seen yet but are about to see! Time and space do not function correctly in Sierra Bonita. Everything is completely out of wack!

In this album I arranged the images in the order we see it happen in the film:

Notice all those HUGE inconsistencies?

Are you all starting to see how crazy this all is?

[this stuff would be SO MUCH easier to explain in video format!]

Anyway it's not over quite yet.

When Rita and Betty start walking to #17, Rita, then Betty both look to the right and we see this POV again:

It's the same screen door and apt from the first paragraph, something shown at the beginning of their walk. So how does THAT make sense? Again, everything is out of wack. We know it's the same apt b/c you can see the tree on the left, same slightly opened screen door.
But this POV is closer to the door, as the POV pans right we see behind the screen door's frame, through its mesh, and see the turned-on porch light:


Yep, it's all pretty damn twisted!

But that apartment, with the screen door, and the turned-on porch light, and the ugly tree. It really is where it's shown to be when B&R walk to #17. We can see the tree behind Betty:

This apt is right in between #12 and #17.... or is it?

The screen door is slightly opened, the light is on, Rita feels the need to look at it and have Betty look at it. It's shown is a creepy ominous POV. Pretty damn curious.

Any thoughts or ideas?

Noticed these inconsistencies too, see http://mulholland-drive.net/studies/wes ... rd_map.htm

I would argue that the editing was "butchered" intentionally, adding to the surreal nature of the dream world.

Interesting. According to Bob's first link, your third screen cap is a shot back down the way they've come, not ahead of them, which ties in with the wall and grass being the other way round.

How do you know that in your fourth screen cap they're by apt 17?

As to 16 vs. 17 there are some thoughts in this thread.

It sucks that I can't edit after a certain amount of time. I used the wrong tags for the album link, which illustrates the approach to #12 much better: http://imgur.com/a/FBLxu

Siku wrote:How do you know that in your fourth screen cap they're by apt 17?.

It's the 5th screenshot. The background is completely different than the 4th, and completely different from the background when B&R talk to the lady in #12. Two times it cuts to them, when they're supposedly standing in front of #12 (@ this point in the film), showing them standing in front of #17--it's the same background--the background showing the path that connects 12 and 17 that we see the lady in #12 walk down later. In the album I linked, look at the 5th screenshot (it's different than the 5th in the OP).

Bob wrote:I would argue that the editing was "butchered" intentionally, adding to the surreal nature of the dream world.

Absolutely. And possibly even more. I do not believe for a second that these are continuity errors. I think the close-up of their feet walking is the most intuitive clue to support that. There's something about it... a feeling of disorientation, and seemingly walking much more than they actually are, and even "teleporting" between instances in time. That's not the only example of this (teleporting) either. For example when Betty is on the phone with Ruth lying on the couch. As soon as she mentions Rita the camera suddenly takes on a life of it's own and begins moving toward the bedroom door, which suddenly opens, by Betty who seemingly just teleported, even though it's made to seem like a "trick" or piece of "movie magic" to represent a quick "blink" in time. Also much like Diane getting coffee and then walking to the couch--the seamless transition that follows--that also seemed to just be a "blink" in time (and this scene is not part of the dream... the world outside the dream is just as absurd and dream-like).

Just before that couch scene we had Diane standing in her kitchen with bedhead, and suddenly sees a so-called hallucination of Camilla standing in front of her and becomes happy, then becomes horrified b/c apparently the so-called hallucination turned into Diane herself--without bedhead. The film's entire POV then shifts to this so-called hallucination who proceeds to make coffee. Yeah... wtf?

And then of course there's all the disappearing acts.

Edit: This one is not as obvious but something I recently realized. When Betty and Rita are at Winkies, and Rita suddenly remembers something, something peculiar happens. Rita looks excited to have remember this, and we all know Betty is probably itching to know, too. So why doesn't Rita just say it, in that moment? Instead, it cuts to them entering Ruth's apartment door, and it's as if NO TIME has even passed b/c Betty instantly says--with excitement--what is it? and Rita exclaims the name. This seamless transition, even though there has apparently been an unseen passage of time and distance, leads me to believe that this unseen passage did not happen at all. B&R just jump from one scene the the next and in that world, this was a second that passed not an unseen 10 minutes of them travelling back to Havenhurst. That never happened. B/c it makes no sense. They just walked back quietly and held it in until they got back to the apartment? I don't think so...

IDK if that makes sense to anyone else... but I believe that these bits of movie magic that audiences are accustomed to, such as "unseens gaps in time" in order to save time and skip over the mundane. These things rely on the viewers suspension of disbelief, and I believe Lynch uses them completely differently in his films. He calls attention to them as if saying look, don't suspend your disbelief. I want you to disbelieve. Lynch is the man behind the curtain telling us to look behind it.

Siku, can you post the link to that view? I can't seem to get there myself.

Searching for "2906 Griffith Park Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90027" on google maps (not 2900 as it says on the main site) brings you to this page but subsequent zooms don't update the URL so you'll have to do that yourself.

Here's the google streetview. You can see the number 2906 on the right, it looks like each apt has it's own number. I can also see an orange dot that looks suspiciously like that bird of paradise flower!

Just wanted to point out one thing about when Betty and Rita enter the courtyard that hasn't been mentioned in this thread or in the link in the 2nd post of this thread.

After Rita's scare, they enter the courtyard from the LEFT side of a wooden door with some brickwork on the wall and surrounding flowers.

Then, after they are done talking with DeRosa, we think they are walking away from Apt 12 and headed down to Apt 17, but they are actually entering the courtyard again for the 1st time because they are passing by the same wooden door as they passed by earlier but from the RIGHT this time instead of the left.

How could they pass by the same door twice if they passed by it already when they first entered the courtyard? How could they pass it one time from the left and then another time from the right?

We are being shown two separate events. The first event, they enter the courtyard from the left side of the wooden door and head to Apt 12 where they speak to DeRosa. In the second event, they enter the courtyard from the right side of the wooden door and head down to Apt 17 passing right by Apt 12.

The second time they enter the courtyard, Betty says, "I guess you're not Diane Selwyn." Rita says, "I guess I'm not." But how could they know this if they have not yet spoke with DeRosa or even passed by her apartment?

Found out some more stuff about this scene.

I was reading the original screenplay. It says that the mattress where the dead body is in unit 17 has holes in it from shotgun blasts.

I've always been a little curious as to why the mattress has been torn apart. I guess it was from a shotgun. Here is the passage from the screenplay:

INT. - BUNGALOW #17 - DAY

Betty and Rita are moving down the corridor. They pass a
small room and look in at a couch, wardrobe and make-up
table. They move on down the corridor to a door which is
almost closed. Betty touches the door and it seems to swing
open on its own. They enter the room and stop cold. A scream
starts to build inside Rita. Before them is a dead woman
lying on a bed. Great chunks of mattress are standing upright
having been ripped and torn by shotgun blasts. A dried sea of
blood surrounds the bloated, gray body of the woman. The
scream comes out of Rita as a force propelling her to look
closer. Betty lunges after Rita, her eyes also not able to
leave the sight. She covers Rita's mouth with her hand and
brings her close. The scream is stifled by Betty's hand.

In the silence that follows, knocking can be heard. Betty
freezes and keeps Rita quiet with her hand still placed over
her mouth, but she can't stop Rita's violent shaking nor the
horror in her eyes.

Coffee Cup wrote:Just wanted to point out one thing about when Betty and Rita enter the courtyard that hasn't been mentioned in this thread or in the link in the 2nd post of this thread.

After Rita's scare, they enter the courtyard from the LEFT side of a wooden door with some brickwork on the wall and surrounding flowers.

Then, after they are done talking with DeRosa, we think they are walking away from Apt 12 and headed down to Apt 17, but they are actually entering the courtyard again for the 1st time because they are passing by the same wooden door as they passed by earlier but from the RIGHT this time instead of the left.

How could they pass by the same door twice if they passed by it already when they first entered the courtyard? How could they pass it one time from the left and then another time from the right?

We are being shown two separate events. The first event, they enter the courtyard from the left side of the wooden door and head to Apt 12 where they speak to DeRosa. In the second event, they enter the courtyard from the right side of the wooden door and head down to Apt 17 passing right by Apt 12.

The second time they enter the courtyard, Betty says, "I guess you're not Diane Selwyn." Rita says, "I guess I'm not." But how could they know this if they have not yet spoke with DeRosa or even passed by her apartment?

Wish someone would comment on this. These broads clearly enter the courtyard twice.

One other thing. After DeRosa takes back her ashtray, we see Diane and Camilla topless on the sofa with the ashtray back on the table. This would imply that we are seeing an event that took place in the past long before DeRosa took back the ashtray. It also implies that the apartment swap took place while Diane and Camilla were still together.

Changes my theory quite a bit, now that we can see the apartment swap having taken place while Diane and Camilla are still together. In my theory, they swap apartments because Diane can't stand being in the apartment that her and Camilla once shared.

Coffee Cup wrote:Wish someone would comment on this. These broads clearly enter the courtyard twice.

Apologies Coffee Cup, I do want to have a look at this. Its an area we've all looked at a lot at it's highly inconclusive. There's a sense of oh no, not this again! Plus I have a newborn baby at the moment and a lot less time for idle hours on the web.

If you look at the 3rd photo in the OP, you can see the wooden door I'm talking about.

They pass by that wooden door twice: Once from the left and a second time from the right.

Coffee Cup wrote:If you look at the 3rd photo in the OP, you can see the wooden door I'm talking about.

They pass by that wooden door twice: Once from the left and a second time from the right.

Yup! That kind of thing is the whole point of this thread! It points out these inconsistencies, and it's not just this door they pass by twice, there's the other wooden door, the first photo in the OP, also gets shown twice, during two different stages of their walk.

Also, as I pointed out in the OP, when they arrive at #12, there are two shots showing Betty and Rita, supposedly standing in front of #12, but when you look at what's behind them, we're actually seeing the same shot that is shown when they arrive in front of #17! It's not until the third cut, when Rita tells Betty not to knock on the door of #12, that suddenly the background is completely different. It makes no sense. The entire Sierra Bonita walk is disorienting and nonsensical, which makes it incredibly interesting. It's more noticeable in this album I made, the screenshots are in order of appearance, trust me! (i used to wrong tags in my OP so the link didn't show up) http://imgur.com/a/FBLxu

Coffee Cup wrote:The second time they enter the courtyard, Betty says, "I guess you're not Diane Selwyn." Rita says, "I guess I'm not." But how could they know this if they have not yet spoke with DeRosa or even passed by her apartment?

Haha, Betty says that because if Rita WAS Diane Selwyn, the woman in #12 would have obviously recognized her immediately.

One other thing. After DeRosa takes back her ashtray, we see Diane and Camilla topless on the sofa with the ashtray back on the table. This would imply that we are seeing an event that took place in the past long before DeRosa took back the ashtray. It also implies that the apartment swap took place while Diane and Camilla were still together.

Changes my theory quite a bit, now that we can see the apartment swap having taken place while Diane and Camilla are still together. In my theory, they swap apartments because Diane can't stand being in the apartment that her and Camilla once shared.

I always assumed she swapped apartments b/c "those detectives came around looking for you again." She's trying to hide. Although yes I am aware that this contradicts the whole ash tray thing during the topless scene. Things never add up the way you want them to in this film. XD