Actress Nikki Grace lands the lead in a Hollywood remake of an unfinished Polish film, one that may be cursed. As she slips into the role of Sue, the line between Nikki and Sue, Los Angeles and Łódź, rehearsal and nightmare, starts to fade. There are talking rabbits, a screwdriver, a woman dying on Hollywood Boulevard, and a neighbour who already knows how the story ends. This is David Lynch, so a neat synopsis is pointless.

I wasn’t in the mood for Lost Highway and I drifted. I was in the mood here, and Laura Dern holds the whole three-hour spiral together. It is shot on harsh digital video that makes faces look like they’re coming apart, which is the point. Lynch’s usual double lives and cursed productions are pushed until the film feels like being locked in someone else’s bad dream.

Of course, it meanders. If you want a plot that makes sense, look elsewhere. But I f you want Dern going further than almost anyone else would dare, and that familiar Lynch dread, look no further. It got under my skin anyway.

4 out of 5 stars