‘BLUE VELVET’

In response to Pat Yoder Garrity’s letter condemning “Blue Velvet” as a film only to be appreciated by every “pervert, sadist, masochist” et al. (Calendar Letters, Oct. 5), it might interest Garrity to know that director David Lynch was aiming at the “decent unsuspecting folk” in all of us. To think otherwise is to miss the point of the film.

Garrity has focused on merely one of the extremes of the film, the violent underside of a small town, while ignoring the interplay of absurd opposites that lead more than one character to declare, “It sure is a strange world.”

“Blue Velvet” transcends the petty morals of middle-class America in order to make a larger statement about the human condition. Decent folk probably would not want to witness this, but then, neither would they want to risk leaving the security of their prime-time television sets.

BRIAN AUSTIN

Corona del Mar