Mulholland Drive (2001)

If you say you understood Mulholland Drive on the first watch, you’re bluffing, and everybody at the table knows it. David Lynch spends most of the runtime building a sunny Hollywood mystery, then yanks the floor out from under you. Naomi Watts is unreal here: her audition scene turns a corny script into something dangerous, and it’s one of the great acting moments of its decade. The diner scene with the figure out back is the scariest thing Lynch ever shot, and it happens in broad daylight. Honest problem: the mob subplot with the cowboy and the guys who hate the espresso feels like it wandered in from a different movie, and some of it never pays off. It made $20.4 million worldwide on a reported $15M budget, which is about right for a puzzle box with no instructions. A 9.2 because nothing else feels like it, even when it makes no sense. $43 says you finish it, sit there in silence, then look up what the blue box means before you even stand up.

What works: Naomi Watts’s audition scene, a diner scene that scares in broad daylight, and the hypnotic Club Silencio.

What doesn’t: The mob and cowboy subplot feels like it wandered in from another movie, and several threads are left dangling for good.

Who it’s for: People who like puzzles without an answer key, and anyone who wants to argue about a movie for a week.