Mulholland Drive Essay

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------------------------------------------------- Discuss the relationship between oneiric content and literary and/or cinematic form in no more than two texts studied in this subject. The medium of film creates an ability to tangibly experience the incomprehensible essence and meaning of dreams while one is still awake, and in doing so it is able to question whether oneiric content within film can restore reality. Mulholland Drive questions what is real, questions oneself and their identity within their unconscious state which then goes on to question whether the unconscious state transports into their waking life. This essay will discuss the relationship between oneiric content and cinematic form that Lynch creates focussing on particular dream sequences that occur. It will explore what cinematic form allows and creates when it engages with portraying oneiric content, concluding that the film represents a new style of narrative where dreams and reality become intertwined as the state of the unconscious and how that transports into reality is questioned. Lynch in his representation of oneiric content uses camera motion and technique to extend the narrative. This allows the film to function from the inside out (Casey, p.1). A sphere is created where the invisible becomes visible. This is seen in the shot of the palm trees where they transform into crossed arms at similar angles. Lynch uncannily uses the cinema as a means of conveying the moods, mysteries and carnivalesque wildness of one’s dreams bringing the oneiric content into an open space for its audience (Bulkely, p.50). The film ventures into Diane’s state of mind via dreams and memories, functioning as an act of wish fulfillment in aspects of love, guilt, and career. Mulholland Drive is furnished with movement and mystery that allows its audience to engage with a new world. This world created transforms
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