David Lynch - Mulholland Drive
An independent analysis by Nicholas Gessler
© 29 September 2002 by Nicholas Gessler

also, please look at our article:
2004 "The Slipstream of Mixed Reality: Unstable Ontologies and Semiotic Markers in The Thirteenth Floor, Dark City, and Mulholland Drive." PDF With N. Katherine Hayles. PMLA (Publications of the Modern Language Association), Special Topic Science Fiction and Literary Studies: The Next Millennium. Issue on Science Fiction. Vol. 119, No. 3, May, Pp. 482-499.

Please let me know what you think...
gessler@ucla.edu
last updated 28 August 2005

• For a perceptive review, see:
  Graham Fuller's, "Babes in Babylon - David Lynch's Mulholland Drive" in Sight & Sound, December 2001, pages 14-17.
• For a perceptive analysis see:
  Bill Wyman, Max Garrone and Andy Klein's, "Everything You Were Afraid to Ask About Mulholland Drive" at Salon.com, October 23, 2001.
• For an unperceptive review, see:
  Rex Reed's, "A Festival of Flops" in New York Observer, October 15, 2002, page 26.

Movie Posters

Diane's Theme Song:

Roy Orbison's CRYING is sung in Spanish at the Club Silencio (1:49:10). It is certainly Diane's theme. The Spanish was written for Rebekah Del Rio by the Venezuelan lyricist, Thania Sanzis. It is a faithful translation of the English text below:

I was all right for a while
I could smile for a while
But I saw you last night
You held my hand so tight
When you stopped to say hello
You wished me well
You couldn't tell that
I've been crying over you,
Crying over you
And you said "So long"
Left me standing all alone,
Alone and crying, crying, crying, crying

It's hard to understand
But the touch of your hand can start me crying

I thought that I was over you
But it's true, so true
I love you even more than I did before
But darling, what can I do?
For you don't love me
And I'll always be crying over you, crying over you

Yes now you're gone
And from this moment on,
I'll be crying, crying, crying, crying Yeah, crying, crying over you

It is sung by Rebekah Del Rio, "La Llorona de Los Angeles." Here are two more references to Diane's predicament. "La Llorona" (literally "the weeping woman") is an Hispanic folk tale about a woman who is jilted by her husband. In despair she drowns their two children in the river, then after nights of weeping in remorse she drowns herself. Her ghostly sobs are often heard in the night. (Thanks to Stanley Allen for pointing out this tale on 11/07/02 and to Edward Gamarra for pointing us to Rebekah's Website on 4/8/03.)

DVD transcript with timing.

ERASERHEAD (Is there any significance to these numbers?)
2416 - address in Eraserhead
25 - apartment number of Eraserhead set in Lynch documentary

MULHOLLAND DRIVE (Is there any significance to these numbers? Certainly 16 is the end of the age of innocence.)
20746 - coded access to Mr. Rook, the guy in the wheelchair (also the zipcode for Capitol Heights, MD, if that makes any sense).
2590 - Address of Diane Selwyn? Adds up to 16. See 1:28:00
1612 Havenhurst - Aunt Ruth's apartment (What is at this address in reality?)
12 - Diane Selwyn's original apartment
17 - Diane Selwyn's present apartment
"16 - Reasons" and "I've Told Every Little Star" song lyrics
16 - Room number that Adam Kesher stayed in at Cookie's Park Hotel
Detectives room number is what?
6980 Mulholland Drive - Adam Kesher's house number on Mulholland Drive. (What is at this address in reality?)

h : m : s from beginning (raw data)	minutes from beginning (rounded)	iNoteworthy dialog and image changes... (see color coding above) (the vertical axis is NOT to scale)	Narrative State
0:0:00	0	Universal Studios Logo	Titles
0:0:22		Studio Canal Logo
0:0:24		Begin Titles
0:0:43	1	Jitterbug Contest	Backstory
0:1:46		Overlay
0:2:00		Betty
0:2:09		Grandparents
0:2:10	2	Sleeping under red sheets. Uneasy breathing. Zoom into orange blanket.	Realtime
0:2:42	3	"Mulholland Drive" sign. Titles intercut and end.	Dream
0:4:50		Rita (in actual life Camilla Rhodes): "What are you doing? We don't stop here."
0:5:45		Car crash.
0:7:36		"Franklin Avenue" sign.
0:8:13		"Sunset Blvd." sign.
0:8:46		Rita dozes next to a sprinkler.
0:8:57		At the accident scene.
0:9:36		Detectives: "Could be someone's missing, maybe." "That's what I'm thinking.
0:10:12		Look down towards Sunset Blvd.
0:10:24		Aunt begins to leave apartment.
0:10:59		Rita sneaks into her apartment.
0:11:33		Aunt returns to apartment to get her keys.
0:12:02		At Winkie's restaurant.
0:12:35		Man: "I've had a dream about this place. It's the second one I've had."
0:15:14		Dream premonition that comes to pass as the man stands at the cashier.
		All the passing automobiles are shades of blue.
0:16:40		Derelict appears from behind dumpster. Man faints. (Derelict's hair is similar to Louise Bonner's.)
0:17:00		Rita is dreaming.
0:17:11		Man in wheelchair. (Mr. Rook?)
0:17:24		Man in wheelchair: "That girl is still missing." He makes some calls.
0:17:39		Dirty yellow telephone rings.
0:18:07	18	Black telephone rings under red lamp alongside mosaic ashtray with buts.	Realtime
0:18:11	19	Betty (in actual life Diane Selwyn) arrives at LAX with older couple. "Oh, I can't believe it!" "Good bye Betty." "Thank you Irene."	Dream
0:19:37		Cabbie: "Where to?" Betty: "1612 Havenhurst."
		Older couple in taxicab with forced smiles.
0:20:11		Drive down palm-lined roadway.
0:20:15		"Hollywood" sign.
0:20:21		Betty arrives at apartment. Walks through entryway.
0:21:06		Betty meets the manager, Coco Lenoir.
0:21:30		Coco: "Wilkins, if that damned dog craps in the courtyard..."
0:21:50		Coco explains the mess caused by the prizefighting kangaroo.
0:22:06		Betty and Coco enter the apartment. Orange hues.
0:23:50		Betty looks in mirror.
0:24:00		Sees Rita in the shower. Betty: "I'm Aunt Ruth's niece."
0:24:58		Betty: "What's your name?"
0:25:18		Betty opens blue suitcase.
0:25:33		Rita sees a poster of Rita Hayworth in the mirror.
0:25:50		Rita, not knowing her own name, adopts the name from the poster. Rita: "My name is Rita."
0:26:22		Betty: "I'd rather be known as a great actress than a movie star."
0:26:42		Betty: "I just came here from Deep River, Ontario and now I'm in this dream place. You can imagine how I feel."
0:26:55		Rita has a dizzy spell.
0:27:10		Rita: "I need to sleep. It'll be OK if I sleep." Betty reads note that says, "Enjoy yourself Betty. Love, Aunt Ruth."
0:27:47		Skyscrapers.
0:28:12		Adam Kesher, Director, and Robert Smith, his manager, arrive at Ryan Entertainment.
0:29:17		They are introduced to the Stigliani brothers.
0:29:50		A photo is circulated of Camilla Rhodes.
0:31:10		One of the brothers: "This is the girl."
0:32:20		Eye to eye confrontation.
0:32:44		One of the brothers spits out his espresso.
0:33:13		One of the brothers yells: "This is the girl. It is no longer your film. This is the girl."
0:34:45		Adam smashes the window of the brothers' limousine and speeds off.
0:35:00		Betty looks admiringly at Rita sleeping.
0:35:15		Mr. Rook in his wheelchair listens but never speaks.
0:35:57		To Mr. Rook: "Shut everything down?..."
0:36:34		Fade to black.
0:36:44		At a seedy private investigator's office. "An accident like that? That story - it made you laugh."
0:37:50		We see Ed's famous black book.
		Shoots detective.
		Shoots fat lady next door.
0:40:13		Shoots vacuum cleaner man.
		Shoots vacuum cleaner.
0:40:50		Smoke alarm goes off. Man exits through window down fire escape.
0:41:13		Betty: "I'm going to study those lines."
0:42:09		Rita: "We don't need the police."
0:44:13		Betty finds lots of paper money in Rita's purse.
0:44:50		Betty finds blue anodized aluminum key in Rita's purse.
0:45:04		At Pink's restaurant. A pimp, a hooker (very much like Diane) in her naïveté, and a gray-haired man.
		A man walks by with a long red plastic pipe. (According to Semi Aboud, the red pipe also appears in another Lynch film, "Wild at Heart," during a scene shot through a window at the Big Tuna motel in which Nicholas Cage is walking to his car. The commentary to that film says the red pipe is an homage to Jacques Tati's "Mon Oncle," a comedic critique of plastic modernism. See TatiVille and Mon Oncle. 8/28/2005)
0:46:04		Betty: "All that money..."
0:46:45		Adam, while driving in his car, hears that "they've fired everyone."
0:47:24		Shot of palm trees lining a roadway.
0:47:33		Nice dissolve to shot of Betty looking skyward.
0:47:53		Rita: "That's where I was going - Mulholland Drive."
0:48:17		Betty: "Come on. It'll be just like in the movies. We'll pretend to be someone else."
0:49:00		Adam drives home. The pool chairs are pink and white.
		Adam finds his wife Lorraine in bed with the pool man.
		Adam selects pink paint, not blue, and pours it on her jewelry.
		Lorraine is wearing blue when she walks in to stop him.
0:52:27		Adam drives off, passing a man raking leaves.
0:52:35		Betty and Rita, talking about the money: "Let's hide it."
0:53:20		Betty and Rita look for a phone. There are many reflections in a glass window.
0:54:22		Betty calls the police department. Betty to Rita: "There was an accident."
0:54:51		In Winkie's restaurant. Betty notices the waitress' name tag "Diane." Rita looks skeptical.
0:55:40		Rita at Betty's apartment: "Diane Selwyn, maybe that's my name."
		Betty: "It's strange to be calling yourself." Rita: "Maybe it's not me..."
0:56:49		A "heavy" goes to Adam's house looking for Adam.
0:57:51		Heavy slugs pool man.
0:57:57		Heavy slugs Lorraine.
0:58:10		Skyscrapers. Adam arrives at room 16 at the run-down Park Hotel.
0:59:38		Cookie, the manager: "Whoever you're hiding from, they know where you are."
1:00:02		Adam calls his secretary Cynthia.
1:00:31		Cynthia: "The cowboy wants to see you." "Jason called." She flirts with Adam.
1:01:23		Cynthia tells Adam to go to the top of Beechwood Canyon.
1:02:16		Betty and Rita study a map. Betty: "Sierra Bonita. Tomorrow we'll go over there and we'll find out."
1:02:45
1:03:04		Louise Bonner, a neighbor knocks at Betty's door. Louise: "Someone is in trouble. Who are you? What are you doing in Ruth's apartment?" Betty: "My name is Betty." Louise: "No it's not."
1:04:27		Louise: "It was someone else who was in trouble." She looks towards Rita.
1:04:55		Adam drive up the canyon to a coral.
1:06:00		A faulty repeatedly light dims and relights.
1:06:23		The cowboy appears in a white hat.
1:07:09		Cowboy: "Are you telling me what you thought I wanted to hear?"
1:08:07		Cowboy: "Stop being a smart alec."
1:08:50		Cowboy: "When you see the girl in the picture, you will say, 'This is the girl.'"
		Cowboy: "You will see me one more time if you do good. You will seem me two more times if you do bad. (We see him twice more, the first time at 1:56:41, the second at the party.
1:09:36		Fade to black.
1:09:40		"Hollywood" sign.
1:09:45		Betty rehearses for Sylvia North Story with Rita in Ruth's apartment. Betty: "You're still here? Nobody wants you here."
1:10:45		Betty: "Get out of here before I kill you."
1:11:09		Coco: "Hi there, who are you?"
1:18:20		Coco to Betty outside: "That's a load of horse puckey. Don't make me out to be a sucker."
1:13:01		Betty: "Everything is AOK."
1:13:14		Detectives drive by...
1:13:33		Betty leaves for audition...
1:13:47		A yellow cab drives Betty up to the studio portal.
1:14:02		Introductions by Wally Brown: Betty Elms. Jack Tupman, assistant. Woody Katz, actor. Bob Brooker, director of the Sylvia North Story (mentioned again 2:13:19). July Chadwick. Linnie James, casting agent. Nikki, her assistant. Martha Johnson. Woody mentions the "other girl with dark hair."
1:15:13		"Play the scene."
1:16:47		"Action!" (Note: This scene is mimiced in the movie SIMONE from time 1:16:00 to 1:17:00 with Winona Ryder and Al Pacino..)
1:18:13		Betty: "This will be the end of everything."
1:19:46		Betty: "I hate you. I hate us both."
1:21:34		Commenting on Betty's stellar performance: "Where the Hell did you find her?" Linnie and Nikki walk Betty to a casting audition next door.
1:22:53		The set is a set within a set with Carol auditioning and singing "16 Reasons."
1:24:00
1:25:00		Camilla Rhodes (in actual life Camilla's other lesbian lover) auditions and sings "Why Haven't I Told You?"
1:25:10		In the background: "Sylvia North Story, Camilla Rhodes, Take One."
1:25:57		Adam: "Get Jason over here."
1:26:54		Adam: "This is the girl." Another man: "Excellent choice."
1:27:30		Betty and Adam exchange loving looks as Betty says, "I have to be somewhere..."
1:28:00		Betty to Taxi driver: "Should be around here... 2590"
1:28:44		Betty and Rita exit taxi to apartments in search of Diane Selwyn.
1:29:19		The directory says: "D. Selwyn #12" and "W. De Rosa (?) #17."
1:31:22		Rita to Betty as she prepares to knock: "Don't."
1:32:00		Resident: "#17. She's in number 17."
1:33:40		Rita and Betty climb to the porch of #17.
1:34:30		Betty climbs in the window.
1:36:09		Betty and Rita find a dead body on the bed. The corpse is dark-haired, like Rita. Rita is overwhelmed.
1:36:45		Betty and Rita flee amidst multiple images of themselves.
1:36:56		Betty cuts Rita's hair. Rita begins to take on Betty's identity in her apartment.
1:37:55		Betty: "You look like someone else." (Betty and Rita exchange shirt colors?)
1:38:10		Diane, in bed, invites Rita to join her.
1:40:11		Diane and Rita kiss.
1:41:22		Diane asks Rita if she has done this before. Rita can't remember. Diane: "I want to, with you."
1:41:45		Diane: "I'm in love with you."
1:42:26		Betty's profile and Diane's full face visually combine to form one.
1:42:37		"Silencio - No hay banda."
1:43:30		Rita Realtimens and says to Betty: "Go with me somewhere."
1:43:55		Betty and Rita take a taxi.
1:44:50		Cab arrives at Club Silencio.
1:45:35		Male performer: "No hay banda, and yet..."
1:46:55		Male performer: "It's all recorded..."
1:47:21		Male performer: "It is an illusion..."
1:47:34		Diane begins to shake uncontrollably...
1:48:17		The portal again. A blue-haired woman is sitting in a high booth.
1:48:42		Male performer: "Senoras y Senores, el Club Silencio les presenta "La Llorona de Los Angeles, Rebekah Del Rio."
1:49:10		Rebecca, disheveled and distraught, sings Roy Orbison's "Crying," then falls to the floor dead.
1:52:31		Rita finds an anodized blue aluminum box.
1:53:12		Rita and Diane take the box back to the apartment.
1:53:35		Betty has now disappeared.
1:54:42		Rita removes the key. (Symbol that the murder has been carried out.)
1:55:05		Rita opens the box. (Unlocking the realization of the murder.)
1:55:30		The box drops to the floor.
1:56:10		Aunt Ruth enters the apartment.
1:56:27	116	A loud rumbling sound. Image of dead body on bed.	Realtime
1:56:41		Cowboy's voice: "Hey pretty girl, time to wake up."
1:57:03		Diane wakes up from sleeping on the bed.
1:58:13		Neighbor: "Come on Diane, it's been three weeks."
1:59:07		Neighbor takes the ash tray next to a standard blue anodized aluminum key.
1:59:38		Neighbor: "Two detectives were by."
2:00:27	120	Diane sees Camilla. Diane: "You've come back."	Flashback
2:00:55	121	Diane is Realtime and disheveled.	Realtime
2:01:29	122	Diane and Camilla begin to have sex on the sofa.	Flashback
2:02:45		Camilla stops her: "We shouldn't do this anymore." Diane: "Don't say that. It's him, isn't it?"
2:03:20		Diane watches Adam rehearse Camilla in a love scene.
2:05:32		Diane: "It's not easy for me."
2:05:50	125	Diane is Realtime, masturbating, trying to bring back the memory of making love to Camilla. She is unsuccessful.	Realtime
2:06:55		Phone rings next to the red lamp.
	128	Phone rings. Camilla invites Diane to her engagement party at 6980 Mulholland Drive.	Flashback
2:09:50		Camilla leads Diane out of the limousine and up a back entrance to Adam's house. Camilla: "Come on sweetheart."
2:11:15		Adam: "Welcome Diane."
2:11:53		Coco, Adam's mother, welcomes Diane somewhat insincerely.
2:12:45		Coco: "So you rolled in here from Canada?" Diane: "My aunt died, left me some money."
2:13:19		Diane auditioned for the Sylvia North Story. Diane: "The director (Bob Brooker, see 1:14:02) didn't think so much of me."
2:15:04		Camilla kisses the girl who was named Camilla Rhodes in Diane's dream.
2:16:06		At the diner there's the sound of breaking glass. Diane negotiates with a hitman to murder Camilla. The waitress is wearing a tag that says "Betty." Diane hands the hitman a picture of Camilla saying: "This is the girl."
2:17:43		The hitman says he will leave Diane a blue anodized aluminum key as a token that the job is finished.
2:18:00		Diane: "What does it open?" The hitman laughs. There is a man (the man with the bad dreams in Diane's dream) standing at the register (see 15:14).
2:18:37	138	The derelict is playing with the blue aluminum box. (His hair is similar to Louise Bonner's.)	Dream
2:19:09		Diane's grandparents, in miniature, toddle out of the derelict's paper bag.
2:19:15	139	Key and ring.	Realtime
2:20:06		There is a knock at Diane's door. Diane sees her grandparents, in miniature, crawling under the door.
2:20:41		Diane, tormented, runs to her bedroom chased by hallucinations of her grandparents.
2:21:05		Gunshot.
2:21:25	141	Derelict's face.	Postscript
2:21:37		Diane, as the ingénue, in silhouette.
2:21:55		Diane and Camilla, as lovers, in silhouette.
2:22:15		At the Club Silencio, the blue haired lady: "Silencio." (Silencing the voices haunting Diane.)