BLACK AND BLUE IN VELVET
Those ads for “Blue Velvet” are touting lots and lots of raves. Makes it sound like . . . wow. True, some critics loooooooove the weird psycho-sexual mystery, but plenty hate it. And some who love and hate it.
Samplings you may not find in the ads:
“Plotless, pretentious and putrid”--Michael Medved and Jeffrey Lyons, “Sneak Preview.”
“Disturbing and disturbed”--Bill Harris, “At the Movies.”
“Sickest wallow in filth and sleaze”--Rex Reed, “At the Movies.”
“Maddening ballet of brutality”--David Sheehan, KNBC-TV.
“In a strange and ironic way, a film like ‘Blue Velvet,’ superbly made or not, adds to the ugliness it seems to be deploring. Do we add to it by being there? I say we do, but that’s a moral call, not a critical one”--Gerald Nachman, S.F. Chronicle.
Orange County Register’s Michael Burkett sums up what many fans feel--that they’re in a strange minority: “There is brilliance everywhere you look. . . . Too bad I can only think of three or four people I know who might actually enjoy the movie.”
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