Indie icon David Lynch returns to the big screen following a six-year hiatus with this uncompromising, brain-scrambling drama. A piece of digital art rather than mere entertainment, it's so cerebrally free-flowing and surreal that no amount of plot spoilers could reveal its secrets. This is old-school Lynch, in his purest and most magnificently self-indulgent form. Not the crowd-pleasing Lynch-lite of Mulholland Drive, this is a beautiful, bewitching and terrifying feature, to be experienced, not understood. The sort of atmospheric enigma that demands repeated viewings.

No-one does mindfuck cinema like Lynch - especially this type of merging-realities tale, in which a Hollywood actress (Laura Dern) faces an escalating nightmare after winning a coveted role in a cursed studio production. What's more, no other filmmaker gives women such meaty material, exploring the eternal madonna/whore conundrum with an intoxicating darkness that's stingingly sadistic yet strangely affectionate.

Little wonder Dern visibly relishes her part, pouring out her soul as starlet Nikki, while a nerve-jangling score sonically reflects her emotional conflict. Embarking on an ill-advised affair with her lead man (Justin Theroux), she becomes increasingly consumed by her character, Susan, until neither she - nor we - are certain who she really is, or whether the disturbing scenes that unfold are depicting Nikki or Susan's life.

Is there an exact explanation for events? Perhaps not, as Lynch apparently never had a full script anyway, choosing instead to make up everything as he went along. Which vaguely accounts for the delicious quirks, including sexy young hookers dancing and lip-synching to 'The Loco-Motion', and giant talking rabbits. At almost three hours long, this will probably alienate less die-hard fans, but even if it could have benefited from slight pruning, there's no denying the genius and imagination at work.