Menu All Search IMDb Watchlist Sign In

Blue Velvet (1986) Blue Velvet

FAQ Opinion
Awards
Add to FAQ
FAQ
User Reviews
User Ratings
Showing all 13 items External Reviews
Jump to: FAQs (13) | Spoilers (0) Metacritic Reviews

FAQs Edit
Explore More

Why was Jeffrey crying?

Create a list »
User Lists
Jeffrey realized that he was becoming like Frank Booth and that he had succumbed to his
dark side when he agreed to hit Dorothy during their love-making. Related lists from IMDb users

Edit Filmer sedda 2021

a list of 47 titles
created 2 months ago

How could had Blue Velvet ended?

Films "Everyone" Has
Blue Velvet could had multiple endings. One possible ending could had taken place some Seen Except Me
a list of 49 titles
months after Jeffrey kills Frank and Dorothy revealing she is pregnant. Another possible created 04 Mar 2017
ending could had seen the movie end with everything that happened in the movie
revealed to be all a dream and in reality, Jeffrey is a patient at a mental hospital and is
seen telling a doctor (Who resembles Frank) about the dream and it ends with him singing That Wasn't Weird At
All
"Blue Velvet". Another ending could had seen the movie end with Frank shoot Jeffrey in
a list of 35 titles
Dorothy's closet before Jeffrey can shoot him which Sandy and Detective Williams are too created 5 months ago
late to save Jeffrey and one more possible ending could had seen Jeffrey and Dorothy
visiting Dorothy in hospital and informing her that Frank is dead and that the police found
her son and that he is alive and well and Dorothy breaking down and crying when her son BEST OF 2020
a list of 26 titles
is brought to the hospital and embraces him. created 9 months ago

Edit

want to watch
a list of 41 titles
created 02 May 2015
What was Frank Booth's drug?

In several scenes throughout the film, Frank Booth (played by Dennis Hopper) uses a
mask to breathe in gas from a tank, and what the gas actually was has caused See all related lists »
considerable debate over the years. In the script written by David Lynch, it is specified as
being helium, to raise Frank's voice to a higher-pitched tone. On the DVD, Hopper
explains that when he filmed Blue Velvet, he had just gone through detox and was clean Share this page:
for the first time in several years. He brought with him considerable knowledge of various
narcotics, hallucinogens, etc, and told Lynch that he didn't feel helium would be right.
Rather, he said, he believed that Frank would have a tank of amyl nitrate (also known as
"poppers"), a drug used medically by heart patients to regulate their heartbeat, and
recreationally in altered doses to relax the muscles and induce a state of euphoria. Hopper
said that he had experimented with the drug, and that during his highs he experienced
visual hallucinations of glowing objects in front of him. Lynch liked the idea and
incorporated it into the film; hence Frank's "grabbing" motions in some scenes after he's
been inhaling.

Hopper would later go on to say that he wished that he hadn't convinced Lynch not to use
helium, as it only occurred to him after filming how unsettling it would be for a maniac to
be inhaling it and then threatening people with a high-pitched voice.

Edit

Is there a significance to the ear and the bugs?

The severed ear is a key symbolic moment in Blue Velvet, so yes. The scene is important
because the ear is what leads Jeffrey into danger. Indeed, just as Jeffrey's troubles begin,
the audience is treated to a nightmarish sequence in which the camera zooms into the ear
canal of the severed, decomposing ear. Notably, the camera does not reemerge from the
ear canal until the end of the film. When Jeffrey finally comes through his hellish ordeal
unscathed, the ear canal shot is replayed, only in reverse, zooming out through Jeffrey's
own ear as he relaxes in his yard on a summer day.

The bugs seen writhing and fighting at the beginning of the film symbolize the dark and
violent world that lies just barely beneath the veneer of simple small-town life, as typified
by the immaculate green lawn. A product of small-town upbringing himself, Lynch often
explores the darker side of what is often stereotypically seen as the simple, decent life of
rural comunities.

Edit

Is there a soundtrack available for the film?

The Blue Velvet soundtrack by Angelo Badalamenti is a dark combination of classic

composition and vintage/modern pop songs, which mirrors the film's unstated setting
envisioned by David Lynch. Thus, the film has become noted for its diverse musical
selections. Seen as a prominent stylistic feature in the film is the unconventional use of
vintage pop songs, such as Bobby Vintons "Blue Velvet" and Roy Orbison's "In Dreams,"
juxtaposed with an orchestral score inspired largely by Shostakovich. The score makes
direct quotations from Shostakovich's 15th Symphony, which Lynch had been listening to
regularly while writing the screenplay.

There are several 1950s-style pop songs that play a strong role in Blue Velvet and are
invaluable in helping Lynch show the evil as a contrast against the music. These are by far
the most important sound elements because they operate throughout the film. Besides
the traditional dialogue and the aforementioned songs, the sound in Blue Velvet is
primarily traditional instrumentation, consisting of strings and wind instruments. In the
credit sequence, a mysterious, undulating string arrangement seem to foreshadow that
the film will be a mystery. This alludes to the film's mysterious plot, further alluded to by
the recurring snoop music played throughout the film, most notably while Jeffrey plays
detective while exploring the underworld."The Mysteries of Love" song is usually played
during the love scenes between Jeffrey and Sandy. "In Dreams" can be considered as
Franks motto. The dichotomy between good and evil in Lumberton is almost like day and
night, where evil, symbolized by Frank, is night.

Lynch worked with well-known music composer Angelo Badalamenti for the first time in
this film and asked him to write a score that had to be like Shostakovich: very Russian,
the most beautiful thing, yet dark and a little bit scary. Badalamenti's success with Blue
Velvet landed him a place as a contributor to all of Lynch's future feature films.

The track listing is as follows, with the duration of each song/extract in brackets:

1. "Main Title" (1:27)

2. "Night Streets/Sandy and Jeffrey" (3:42)

3. "Frank" (3:34) "Jeffrey's Dark Side" (1:48)

4. "Mysteries of Love" (2:10)

5. "Frank Returns" (4:39)

6. "Mysteries of Love" (instrumental) (4:41)

7. "Blue Velvet/Blue Star" (3:14)

8. "Lumberton U.S.A./Going Down to Lincoln" (2:13)

9. "Akron Meets the Blues" (2:40)

10. Bill Doggett - "Honky Tonk, Pt. 1" (3:09)

11. Roy Orbison - "In Dreams" (2:48)

12. Ketty Lester - "Love Letters" (2:36)

13. Julee Cruise - "Mysteries of Love" (4:22)

Edit

Are there any good books that explore the film?

Yes, there are many. Probably the two best that are soley dedicated to the film are "Blue
Velvet" by Charles Drazin, published in 2001, which can be found on Amazon, or an
insight purely by the author; not really a universal guide, but it's a good read and is also
titled "Blue Velvet." It was written by Michael Atkinson in 1997. Both books are still in
print.

Edit

Where is Lumberton located?

In North Carolina. However, the town of Lumberton has a very Pacific Northwest feel to it,
similar to many towns in David Lynch projects. Lynch based Lumberton on his childhood
hometown of Spokane, WA. The movie was shot in Wilmington, NC mostly (70km away
from the real Lumberton), which led to problems with the name used in the film. Lynch
eventually decided to film parts of the film in the real Lumberton in order to use the
name.

Edit

To whom did the severed ear belong?

It belonged to Dorothy's husband, who can be seen in the film's final moments when
Jeffrey walks into Dorothy's apartment to have one last confrontation with Frank Booth.
Dorothy's husband is the man with blue velvet material stuck in his mouth, missing one of
his ears, which Jeffrey found earlier in the film.

Edit

Was the robin at the end of the film real?

The final scene of the film depicts a robin devouring a bug -- bugs having previously been
used to symbolize the evil beneath the surface of Lumberton. In the script, the robin is
intended to symbolize good triumphing over evil. However, the robin at the end of the film
appears quite obviously fake, leading to speculation that it is a false victory.

According to the DVD special features, David Lynch had initially tried to use a real robin,
which no animal trainer could get to move on cue. Because of the robin's unpredictability,
Lynch ordered a hurried construction on a mechanical robin so that the scene could be
filmed. Because of the rushed schedule and technology available in 1986, the robin is
quite obviously fake; this was not intentional, however. In fact, it was supposedly made
using a dead robin that the prop designer had found on the way in to work that day.
Whether or not Lynch ultimately re-worked the intended meaning of the scene to indicate
that the peace in Lumberton is false and fleeting has been the subject of fan speculation
since the film's release.

Edit

Was the man in the yellow suit dead?

Not quite; Frank had done something to him to give him severe brain damage (in one of
the establishing shots of the apartment, the viewer can see a large chunk of the man's
brains bulging out through a hole in his skull). Frank does kill him, though, upon
returning. So, essentially, the man was still alive but in a daze caused by the severe head
trauma.

Edit

What is the song that Ben is lip-syncing to Frank?

"In Dreams" by Roy Orbison.

Edit

What is the origin of the title song and its significance?

Songwriter Bernie Wayne was staying at the Jefferson Hotel in Virginia when he noticed a
beautiful woman at a party who was wearing a blue velvet dress and crying, no one else
seeming to realise she was there. Inspired he went away and wrote the song, never
finding out who she was or why she was crying. Wayne died in 1993 and no one has ever
been able to identify the woman in question or even locate anyone else who remembers
her, raising the possibility that she may not have existed at all.

Edit

What is Blue Velvet about?

Jeffrey Beaumont (Kyle McLachlan) makes a gruesome discovery and discovers a severed
human ear in a field and reports it to Detective John Williams (George Dickerson). After
meeting Detective William's daughter Sandy (Laura Dern), Jeffrey decides to do his own
investigation. Jeffrey's own investigation leads him to become suspicious of the beautiful
and mysterious nightclub Dorothy Vallens (Isabella Rossellini) whom Jeffrey believes may
be connected to the severed human ear. But, Jeffrey's investigation soon places his life in
danger, when he discovers Dorothy is the sex slave of a psychotic criminal called Frank
Booth (Dennis Hopper), whom is holding her husband and son hostage and whilst hiding
in Dorothy's closet, a horrified Jeffrey witnesses Frank raping Dorothy. Jeffrey finds
himself exploring his own dark side and finds himself, as he continues to investigate,
which becomes an obsession and he becomes sexually involved with Dorothy and he
begins to develop romantic feelings for Sandy and Jeffrey's determination to solve the
mystery of the severed human ear and he soon meets Frank Booth face to face and enters
Frank Booth's sinister criminal underworld, which Jeffrey soon learns that he lives in a
dangerous strange world.

Edit

Spoilers Edit

See also
Awards | User Reviews | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews

Recently Viewed Clear your history

Jocelyn... William... Unrecor...

Get the IMDb App Help Site Index IMDbPro Box Office Mojo IMDb Developer

Press Room Advertising Jobs Conditions of Use Privacy Policy Interest-Based Ads

© 1990-2021 by IMDb.com, Inc.