Wild at Heart is a 1990 American black comedy romantic crime film written and directed by David Lynch and starring Nicolas Cage, Laura Dern, Diane Ladd, Willem Dafoe, Harry Dean Stanton, and Isabella Rossellini. Based on the 1989 novel of the same name by Barry Gifford, it tells the story of Sailor Ripley (Cage) and Lula Pace Fortune (Dern), a young couple from Cape Fear, North Carolina, who go on the run from Lula's domineering mother and the gangsters she hires to kill Sailor. Lynch was going to produce, but after reading Gifford's book, he decided to write and direct as well. He did not like the ending of the novel and thus decided to change it to fit his vision of the main characters. Wild at Heart is a road movie which includes allusions to The Wizard of Oz and Elvis Presley and his movies. Early test screenings for Wild at Heart had a poor reception; Lynch estimated that 300 people walked out of an early screening. On release, the film had mixed critical reviews and grossed $14 million against its $10 million budget. The film won the Palme d'Or at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival, which at the time was considered a controversial decision. Diane Ladd was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance. It has since been positively re-evaluated by critics. Plot Lovers Lula and Sailor are separated after he is jailed for killing a man who attacked him with a knife; the assailant, Bobby Ray Lemon, was hired by Lula's mother, Marietta Fortune. Upon Sailor's release, Lula picks him up outside prison, where she hands him his snakeskin jacket. They go to a hotel where she reserved a room, make love and go to see the speed metal band Powermad. At the club, Sailor gets into a fight with a man who flirts with Lula, and then leads the band in a rendition of the Elvis Presley song "Love Me". Later, back in their hotel room, after making love again, Sailor and Lula finally decide to run away to California, breaking Sailor's parole. Marietta arranges for private detective Johnnie Farragut—her on-off boyfriend—to find them and bring them back. But unbeknownst to Farragut, Marietta also hires gangster Marcello Santos to track them and kill Sailor. Santos's minions capture and kill Farragut, sending Marietta into a guilt-fueled psychosis. Unaware of all of the