Mythology

Pandora was the first woman on Earth. Zeus, father of all Gods, did not appreciate the fact that Prometheus had stolen the Fire from the Gods in order to give it to the humans. Therefore, he demanded that Hephaistos made a woman out of earth and water, just like he had done so to create men. Each Goddess presented her with a gift which is why she's called Pandora (pan : all / dora : gift ), do Sleeping Beauty and her three fairy godmothers ring a bell ? Hermes also gave her a couple of his own gifts, some of which were lying and a certain liking for stealing. On his behalf, Zeus offered her a present for her promised husband, Prometheus, a perfectly locked beautiful box that no one was ever to open, anyone remembers Bluebeard and his key?

Prometheus did not fall for this trap and refused to marry Pandora. He also advised his brother to do the same. But Epimetheus, stunned by Pandora's beauty, could not help but marry her the very next day.

And she opened the famous box from which escaped all the woes of the world. Through this myth, Pandora's box stands for all the pain humans have to undergo.

A woman, the Woman, was the messenger of it but when one closes the box once opened, it is said that the one thing to remain inside is Hope!

 

The blue box in Mulholland Drive

At the Silencio theatre, Betty wipes her tears away and reaches for her bag, probably looking for a tissue. Then she pulls out a square blue box with a keyhole. The singer's voice, saying "Llorando por tu amor" meaning "I'm crying for your love", stops at the very moment Betty shows the box to Rita. The camera focuses on the movement of Betty's cupped hands, revealing her pink painted nails.

Then they come back home and Betty puts the box on the edge of the bed. Rita takes the large round-striped box, already used in the beginning of the film to hide the money. She pulls out the black bag and realizes Betty has disappeared. She looks around and calls her name but does not find her. She opens the bag, finds the key, and uses it to unlock the blue box. As soon as the box is opened, Rita seems to be sucked in, just like magic. The box falls to the ground. A woman, Betty's Aunt Ruth, comes into the room and takes a look around but everything is gone.

The end of the dream pink part is announced with the knocks on the door, referring to the three knocks used in classical theater to present the beginning of a new act. Betty/Diane is awoken from her dream, she snaps back to reality. The blue key that we see on the coffee table indicates that the murder has been committed.

The next time we see the blue box is in a dark street. A homeless man, the same one we saw in the beginning of the movie with the scene at Winkie's, is seen fiddling with the box. He places it in a paper bag at his feet, then the same old couple we saw at the airport, this time seen in miniature, walks out of the bag with crackling laughter. The paper bag, for an American viewer, would be a reference to alcohol since in the US it is mandatory to use a paper bag when carrying alcoholic beverages in public. The hallucination that Betty experiences looks like many movie depictions of delirium tremens where small creatures like spiders, rats, etc., come crawling out of nowhere. Here, alcohol is used as a symbol of Betty's addiction to Camilla.

Maybe these old people symbolize also fate, what is to happen. The blue box announces great woes in reality. When it appears for the first time, Betty and Rita vanish into thin air. This represents the end of Diane's dream, leading to the presence of the key on the coffee table, meaning Camilla's murder by Diane. The blue box appearing the second time signifies Diane's unbearable reality, her fall to hell from what she could have been to what she's become (the two elderly people in miniature remind her of her past innocence).

 

This page was contributed by Thierry Richard, January 20, 2005
Proofread by BM.