Isabella Rossellini corrects the record on Blue Velvet

Considering the constant stream of actresses speaking out about the ways they were made to feel uncomfortable and exploited by male directors during past shoots, it’s nice to hear at least one account where the feeling went the other way. In a recent interview, Isabella Rossellini opened up about the response to her breakout role in the controversial 1986 film Blue Velvet—directed by her then-partner David Lynch—in which she plays a lounge singer held captive by a psychopathic gangster. “I remember I was told that Roger Ebert said that [Lynch] exploited me, and I was surprised, because I was an adult. I was 31 or 32. I chose to play the character,” she said (via IndieWire).

The legendary critic gave the film one star in his 1986 review. In a particularly scathing passage, he writes: “Rossellini is asked to do things in this film that require real nerve… She is degraded, slapped around, humiliated and undressed in front of the camera. And when you ask an actress to endure those experiences, you should keep your side of the bargain by putting her in an important film.”

Given how unfortunately often we’re still having the same conversation around male-directed sexploitation films today, Ebert’s insight is in many ways ahead of its time. Rossellini, however, thinks we should also allow space to question the “rigidity of if you make a film about a woman, it has to be a woman [director].” “First of all, Blue Velvet is also about men, so who’s going to make the film?” she continued. “If you make a film about the aliens, they have to have aliens direct? It doesn’t make any sense.”

Even though Rossellini and Lynch are no longer together, she also had a lot of kind words for her former director. “I’m glad Blue Velvet was directed by David Lynch,” she said. “He’s such a great author. I think my character was the first time we did an abused woman, a portrait of an abused woman, but also she camouflaged herself behind what she was asked to be, which was sexy and beautiful and singing, and she obeys the order, and is also victimized it. That’s the complexity of Blue Velvet but also the great talent of David Lynch. I thought he did a fantastic film. I love Blue Velvet.”

In her current life, Rossellini is still advocating for understanding nuance in film. There’s a small movie theater in her town that did a Charlie Chaplin series, she explained, and she was surprised by how many parents had never seen a silent film before but was heartened by how many took their children. “He was a discovery,” she said, and then echoing Martin Scorsese (another director ex-partner): “The children… are getting used to watching black and white, and not to look at film as this spectacular thing, like an amusement park.” She’s right, but also… look out, Isabella!