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Camilla is not dead
Many theories are based on Diane killing Camilla but what if that is not the case? After all, Mr. Lynch does leave it open to interpretation.
Core to this theory lies with refuting that Joe is a hit man. Certainly, Lynch helps the hit man theory along by showing Joe as a cold-blooded assassin. The core problem with that is assuming that anything presented in a dream reflects reality i.e. is Joe really a hit man? Perhaps Lynch gives us a small clue to dismiss Joe in that role, as he appears so incompetent.
In Winkie’s, Diane only says, “this is the girl” which only implies what we choose to believe. The money could be for Joe’s services to spy on Camilla or try to find her. It also could be quite innocent with Diane and Joe talking about her purchase of a car or a house trailer, etc. The picture of Camilla may simply indicate Joe’s infatuation with Camilla as a movie star and didn’t want the photo flashed around, as he is embarrassed.
We are tricked into connecting the dinner party scene with the diner scene, thinking the party was a flashback connecting Diane’s anger and humiliation to the party. But the evidence is more likely that the diner scene is the flashback as we see Dan at the cashier’s register in the same clothes he was in during the Dan and Herb Winkie’s scene. This makes it quite feasible that Diane and Joe were there the same morning Dan and Herb were – with Dan first to arrive. However, to suggest this means that the Dan and Herb scene reflects reality rather than a dream. As the bum does appear before the final scene, this is plausible.
Is Lynch building a false case for us to stumble on? After all, we look at a blue key as some signal of guilt on the part of Diane when it simply may be a key to a motorcycle that takes her back to her hometown – another disgrace victim of the Hollywood machine. A return to an unhappy childhood and perhaps a sexually abused past that Diane can’t deal with, irrational choosing suicide instead.
Another possibility was that Diane used her inheritance money to help Camilla’s career. It also might be part of the answer to David Lynch’s question/clue: did success alone help Camilla? Perhaps it was Diane that helps Camilla that backfired on her causing her enough pain to contemplate suicide. Perhaps the blue key is to a trigger lock for a handgun – one that Diane disables and sticks in her night table. Thus, Camilla, the star of Hollywood lives on – it is the little people that go by the wayside.
Hopefully this theory opens up a lot of other possibilities for the viewer to explore, as the theory is certainly contrarian to some central theories.
A chief weakness to the theory would be that the theory ignores the dreams or dreams as metaphors. A key example would be Rita horrified over seeing her own body dead and rotting on the bed. Is this not the dead Camilla, a woman hiding out in a crummy apartment from her former life? Even the shaken Rita from the limo ride certainly suggests her being in mortal danger.
As this theory’s strength lies in offering up several different plausible ideas so does its weakness, as the theory is not centrally grounded to one core idea or well connected string of ideas.