Wild at Heart
David Lynch, 1990, USA, Colour, 125 mins, Certificate: 18
“It’s the whole world wild at heart and weird on top” says an exasperated Lula.
She could be talking about the film itself. The great’s, late’s, Lynch’s most controversial and divisive cinematic dream, which won the Palm D’ Or for Best Film at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival, amid a cacophony of intense cheers and relentless boos.
35 years after that first wild and weird ride it remains Lynch’s least celebrated film. Yet, it may well be his most underappreciated one. And, as it is his less fastidious (it was completed only a day before it premiered at Cannes), more spontaneous, filled with improvisations work, the most direct line to his unique mind and worldview.
Unruly, raw, uninhibited, wickedly funny, and uncompromisingly honest in both its depictions of violence, with all its grim consequences, and love, against all odds, unspoiled, tireless, redemptive love, it unspools like a demented romantic comedy, a darkly imaginative, pedal to the metal road movie and a contemporary, unflinching western, a nightmare and a wonderful dream, all at once.
As Lula, (the impeccable Laura Dern), along with the man she loves, Sailor, (the fearless Nicolas Cage), flees from her traumatic family past, her deranged mother (Dern’s real life mother, the Oscar nominated, Diane Ladd) and all the weirdos she keeps sending to kill Sailor, our minds are blown and our hearts stolen. Again.
And as the world around us seems more and more “wild at heart and weird on top”, seemingly succumbing to various, outrageous weirdos, Wild at Heart, surprisingly, becomes Lynch’s most ageless, ever timely film.
So, join us in remembering and celebrating this wild, weird, audacious, one of a kind cinematic dream-weaver.
Reviews:
“Love conquers all… Wild at Heart… sets a love of the purest and most passionate kind against a sun-scorched landscape of ceaseless hostility. The forces of good and evil that Lynch had limited to a small town four years earlier with Blue Velvet are blown out into the larger expanse of the American road.” Scott Tobias, The Guardian
“… it’s churlish to focus on flaws when so much is exhilaratingly unsettling. Even more than a virtuoso shoot-out, two scenes – Stanton tortured by a gang of grotesques, a truly nasty car crash -exemplify Lynch’s ability to disturb through carefully contrived atmosphere; while the performances lend a consistency of tone… The film, finally, is funny, scary and brilliantly cinematic.” Geoff Andrew, Time Out
“Wild At Heart is genuinely funny, with its warped humour serving to deflate the genuinely gory moments. Nicolas Cage does a brilliant line in fat Elvis impersonations, Dern is wonderfully good as the hyperactive Lula, and Lynch’s breathtaking imagination, surefooted direction and bizarre use of colour all add up to a genuine cinematic tour de force. Not for the weak of heart, one of the best Lynchian outings with some fantastically memorable dialogue.” Kenny Matheson, Empire
“Joltingly violent, wickedly funny and rivetingly erotic, David Lynch’s Wild at Heart [based on the novel by Barry Gifford] is a rollercoaster ride to redemption through an American gothic heart of darkness.” Variety