SSI members just got a double-barrel blast of synchro-sanity on David Lynch's masterpiece, Mulholland Drive. It was a nearly three-hour presentation, and yet I'm still champing at the bit for a second round.
There's always a question about intent vs. coincidence vs. unconscious influence when looking at symbolism in film. That is, with films that AREN'T made by David Lynch.
It's also amazing to me how many people get the same dream-like vibe from Mulholland Dr, and how many people totally vibe on it despite the fact that its surface narrative isn't what you'd call coherent. Even if they don't consciously understand the story, I think most viewers intuit the story.
Which is why David Lynch is the absolute master at what he does, and there isn't even a close runner-up.
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One of the central theses of my presentation was how Mulholland Dr. marked the end of Hollywood as dream-factory and the dawn of its grotesque afterlife as theme-park ride-simulator and rapacious IP vampire.
That was enough to keep the cash registers jingling for 20 years or so, but the sheer mendacity and abject cluelessness of the beancounters running the show these days has finally driven the money train straight into the deepest pits of Hell. It will never get back out, because there's no way out.
Ironically, this ESG atrocity of a Snow White film is not the worst offender of the parade of motion picture money pits, but it certainly feels like the straw that will finally break the demon's back.
People of all persuasions have just had enough of the sickening and sophomoric condescension of the AWFLs stinking up the studios these days, and this film seems ill-starred enough to be the donkey with the last tail nailed to its bony, shriveled ass.
Which makes Lynch especially prophetic, in that the cold and cruel collapse of a Hollywood dream depicted in Mulholland Dr. takes place in the real-life Snow White Cottages.
But there's no Prince to kiss away the poisoned apple this time. Even if the strikes are resolved soon, the damage is already done. It's going to be Year Zero in Tinseltown, and all the bluehairs who streamed into town with their cultural-studies degrees are not going to like the new order.
No, not one bit.
You haven't seen "granular" until you seen the roiling hordes of Mulholland Dr theorists, even to this day. So is this all standard-issue conspirasphere speculation or is there actually some meat on that bone? Some commentators, like Jay Dyer, have brought up the mind control lore about Hollywood, but I take an SSI-tier deep-dive into the issue.
Lo and behold, there are many clues that lead one to believe that Lynch was familiar with internet theorizing on MONARCH and beta-kittens the like.
But I also make the argument that aside from the perfectly-valid dream interpretation of Mulholland Dr, there are also a preponderance of clues that could suggest that Diane/Betty wasn't simply dreaming, but was the subject of an elaborate and malicious LARP - a la Shutter Island or The Game - that a bunch of old Hollywood/intelligence/cult weirdos were playing at her expense.
Note that The Game came in 1997, around when Lynch would have been working on Mulholland Dr's script. So there's that.
But remember - it's a secret.
PLAN nEYEn
Fan theorists all tend to believe that Diane had been molested by a man in her family circle (possibly her father, a la Laura Palmer) when she was a young teen, and the presence of a painting of Beatrice Cenci in Aunt Ruth ("A Untruth") apartment is cited as a major clue.
But remembering that Mulholland Dr was released a month and a day after nEYEn11, there's another important detail in Beatrice Cenci's biography...
That's not the only bit of prophecy at work, though...
...nEYEn11 is encoded into the very title of the film.
Naomi Watts - whose CV is a mindfield of Sync - later starred in Sir Peter Jackson's remake of King Kong.
Oddly enough, David Lynch's old boss Dino DeLaurentis also remade King Kong in 1976, with the Twin Towers used in place of the Empire State Obelisk.
Bonus! Reader Mark points out that the clock hands are at 9 and 11 during Dream Camilla's audition.
BARBENHEIMER
Remember how I told you there were some potent syncs in Mulholland Dr pointing to Barbenheimer, which may well soon be seen as Hollywood's great last gasp?
Remember how you thought I was just blowing smoke?
Well, you were wrong, so say you're sorry.
Come on, now: apologize. You hurt my feelings.
First of all, remember Barbie is Barbelon, the Scarlet Harlot of the Apocalypse. Quite literally, in fact.
This syncs with all the clues in Mulholland Dr. that Diane was supporting herself turning tricks, which the fan theorists argue.
Weak, you say?
Hey: calm down. This party is just getting started.
Camilla's alter-ego in Mulholland Drive is Rita, taken from a name she sees on a poster in Aunt Ruth's bathroom.
What's the significance of this?
Well the poster is for the film Gilda, and in true Lynchian fashion...
... Gilda was also painted on the bombers which took part in Operation Crossroads.
What's Operation Crossroads, you ask?
THIS is Operation Crossroads...
• On July 1, 1946, the United States tested a nuclear bomb over Namu island, in the Bikini Atoll, Pacific Ocean. The 15 megaton bomb exploded at 15,000 feet, causing a four-mile fireball, 500 times brighter than the Sun.
Betty/Diane tells us that she came to Hollywood from Deep River, Ontario.
So what's the connection with this particular Scarlet Harlot to Oppenheimer?
Glad you asked...
Deep River, Ontario was created under the aegis of the Manhattan Project.
The Manhattan Project being the very focus of Oppenheimer, right?
The Secret Sun always has the receipts, my good friends. Always.
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