Mulholland Drive is a psychological thriller film by David Lynch that is about a new actress, Betty, figuring out who another actress is (Rita) because of her amnesia. This movie fits in really well with many of the main themes used in the postmodern movies that have been studied such as trauma, figuring out reality versus fantasy, and meta-commentary. Similar to the likenesses of Cache and Shutter Island, Mulholland Drive strives to have an ambiguous ending with many raising questions that goes unanswered. These questions would turn out to be who are Camilla and Diane, do Betty and Rita really exist, and could there be alternate universes that can be traveled to via the blue cubes, and so much more.
While Mulholland Drive’s ending seems to fall under the same category of ambiguity with Cache and Shutter Island, some of the story elements are similar to Sunset Boulevard, which was studied a while back. Both movies take place in Hollywood and are both named after streets that can be found in Hollywood. They also have to do with someone running away from something and staying over the night at someone else’s place. However, the roles seem to be reversed in both movies. In Sunset Boulevard, an aspiring journalist (Joe Gillis) runs away from the cops and stays at a movie star’s house (Norma Desmond). In Mulholland Drive, a movie star (Rita/Camilla) gets in a car crash and runs away and is found by an aspiring actress (Betty/Diane) and stays at her place.
In both movies, there is one character that is named Betty, where in Sunset Boulevard, Betty is Joe’s partner also working in journalism, while in Mulholland Drive, Betty is the name of the aspiring actress that finds Rita/Camilla. Another event that happens during both movies is that when one character goes to Hollywood to fulfill their dreams, the other character gets extremely jealous of the aspiring character’s significant other. In Sunset Boulevard, Joe starts developing feelings for Betty and Norma starts to get jealous. In Mulholland Drive, Camilla starts developing feelings and is having an affair with Adam, the director, and Diane starts to get jealous and starts having a mental breakdown towards the end of the movie. Overall, both Sunset Boulevard and Mulholland Drive have many similarities that talk about Hollywood and how it can affect people as a whole.
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