This is the most complete of David Lynch's films, made before his disturbing black vision of small-town American life veered into self-parody. The dark tone is set from the opening sequence, which starts with white picket fences and cheery firemen but ends with a man suffering a stroke in his garden while insect life seethes beneath the lawn. Kyle MacLachlan (who made his acting debut for Lynch in Dune in 1984) plays the young innocent who gets sucked into the bizarre sadomasochistic relationship between nightclub singer Isabella Rossellini and monstrous local crime boss Dennis Hopper. The latter resurrected his career with a crazed portrait of evil - legend has it that Hopper said "I've got to play Frank. Because I am Frank". Once experienced here, listening to Roy Orbison's In Dreams will never be the same again.

The discovery of a severed human ear found in a field leads a young man on an investigation related to a beautiful, mysterious nightclub singer and a group of psychopathic criminals who have kidnapped her child.