Coffee and Noir: MULHOLLAND DRIVE
every instance of coffee in noir: 043
You can learn a lot about a character by how they take their coffee: sugar? cream? more whiskey than caffeine?
I’m cataloging every noir scene where coffee plays a role — rote and ritual, soul-dark or cream and sugar, served from dingy diners to shiny penthouses.
I really fucking love Mulholland Drive.
Leslye Headland has an excellent theory on why the ‘last act’ is actually about trying to remember the dream which was the first two thirds of the movie.
But whether you buy that theory, accept the general consent (*salutes*) the beginning is a dream and the end depicts ‘reality,’ what’s relevant here: the coffee scene is a — if not THEE — crux!
I’m making no outlandish and impossible promises of ‘unraveling the meaning’ or any such tripe, but I can break down how the elements of coffee are used to clearly set up distinctions between one character and her other . . .
note: there’s leadup for context, the ‘coffee part’ starts around 1:30
The neighbour leaves, Betty / Diane has a break and ‘sees’ Rita / Camille, then starts making coffee . . .
She pours the coffee into a mug: the camera focuses on this, so much is the import laid on this brown ceramic mug the frame doesn’t show Naomi Watt’s face, as it would distract from said plain mug.
Shots switch, janky bathrobe is shed, Betty climbs over the couch, and the camera dollies in on a glass with ice; presumably cold brew and/or whiskey and/or coffee liqueur, as jean shorts indicate the weather calls for.
The beverages in this scene are as far away as you can get from each other, while still being the same thing.
Sound like anything else we know or don’t?