Mental Illness And Mathematics: A Mind Not Beautiful, A Movie Not Compelling

The Good: Decent acting, Interesting elements
The Bad: Characters are dull, Derivative story, Pace is too slow to be considered a thriller, Pointless
The Basics: In a weird movie where the State and Kabbalists use an insane mathematician for their own ends, the viewer ends up bored and unentertained.


My first experience with the works of writer-director Darren Aronofsky came a few weeks ago when I took in the miserable, but great Requiem For A Dream (reviewed here!), which I have no problem admitting was a movie I absolutely hated (though I could recognize its technical brilliance). It was enough for me to look into his other works and that brought me to Pi, a movie I had heard of and wanted to see, but needed to be reminded of.

Maximillian Cohen is a man obsessed with numbers. He has come to believe that all of reality may be expressed numerologically. He, therefore, is investigating numbers - like those of the stock market - to unlock the secrets of the universe. Encouraged by Sol Robeson, a mentor who studied the number Pi, Maximillian finds himself and his skills sought after by the government and Kabbalists. He tries to understand the numbers, when he inadvertently creates a computer glitch that might well be the numerical incarnation of god, and he ends up on the run.

From the two movies I've seen so far of his, Darren Aronofsky seems obsessed with repetition. Both films have sequences of visuals and audio effects that repeat throughout the movie with such regularity that they come to be predicted and, ultimately, become the only memorable aspects of those movies. Pi is more bizarre than the straightforward repetitive drug use in Requiem For A Dream and Max's story that he keeps repeating about staring at the sun is less memorable.

In Pi, it's hard to argue that Aronofsky even had a brilliant idea for a movie. The idea of numbers representing reality is nothing new and numerologists are common enough, even if they are not well-represented in cinema. But if nothing else, Pi illustrates that they aren't very cinematic either. Aronofsky relies on cheap tricks, like shooting in a grainy black and white, to entice the viewer as opposed to telling a compelling story. And for naysayers around here who might be inclined to fight for this film, I GET what Aronofsky is doing and saying with the black and white, it's just cheap to me in this context. It doesn't add a sufficient depth to the story or present the otherwise uninteresting film in a way that makes it any more meaningful.

For those who do not know what Kabbalists are, Jewish mysticism involves a sophisticated numerology wherein the relationship between words in Hebrew and numbers are deeply intertwined. As a result, the connection between words and numbers is thought to be a key to revealing the origins of the divine and will allow those who study the ancient texts in this way to understand god better. Last I knew, Madonna was into Kabbalism.

Regardless of how trendy it might be, Kabbalism is not new or fresh and Pi certainly does not make it compelling as a subject or antagonist. Instead, like the government, the Kabbalists seem like monolithic, generic villains - which when we understand Maximillian and his insanity makes a lot of sense. The thing is, throughout Pi, I had the sense that this was nothing new, though it was trying to be. The story is not exciting and unlike A Beautiful Mind, (reviewed here!) which tried to humanize the protagonist through his wife, this movie does not even have that.

The resolution to the movie is especially disappointing as one my favorite film of all time is Brazil (reviewed here!). Aronofsky seems to have simply lifted a page from Gilliam and the Sid Shienberg "Love Conquers All" version of the superior classic. So, Pi is underwhelming for its plot and presentation and pacing.

That leaves character and acting to evaluate and the truth is, this movie is so far inside the head of Maximillian - I don't believe there is a single scene from anyone else's perspective, which again makes some sense given the resolution of the movie - that none of the other characters are even remotely fleshed out. Their surface personas, as Max presents them in his view, are unremarkable and uninteresting. None of them pop for the viewer to want to know more about, with the exception of Devi, Max's neighbor who appears to have affection for him.

As for Max, it's hard to find him sympathetic as he is so disturbed. The best a director may hope for in a story such as this is empathy. It fails to evoke that. Max is not an empathetic character. One might, at best, feel sorry for how his genius breaks him, but genuinely caring about him as a representation of the human condition is near impossible. With such an unlikable protagonist - watching a mathematician run around with a crazed expression is just boring - Pi feels longer than the 84 minutes it actually is.

The only redeeming aspect of the movie is the acting of Sean Gullette, who plays Maximillian. Gullette is convincing as a mathematician who has gone crazy. He creates the crazy with his eyes and flailing body language. He convinces us of his genius with his cold stare and intense eyes. He makes the viewer believe that he was a man who was great and simply was sucked into something bigger than himself.

But for the most part, this is a jumbled, frenetic movie that is not terribly new or different, though the numerology aspects might be to some. It's a disappointment and it's nice to see that Aronofsky's next endeavor, despite being so disturbing I would never watch it again, illustrated some serious growth into greatness.

For other films by Darren Aronofsky, check out my reviews of:
Black Swan
The Fountain

3/10

For other film reviews, be sure to visit my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Nightmares In Drug Addiction: A Great Film Not Worth Watching - Requiem For A Dream

The Good: Excellent direction, acting, presentation, themes
The Bad: Nightmarish, unredeeming characters
The Basics: Disturbing and horrific, Requiem For A Dream is well directed and well acted and an experience so miserable that it should not be watched. Ever.


This might end up as a short review and if it does, that should certainly say something significant about Requiem For A Dream. It's a rare thing that I rate a movie as high as this one and still give it a "not recommend." It might seem an oxymoron. I can and will acknowledge the technical achievement of Requiem For A Dream, but I can think of no good reason to subject other people to this film.

Sara Goldfarb is an old woman who is lonely and dreams only of appearing on an inspirational television show. When she is invited to be a part of the studio audience for the show, she becomes determined to fit into her old red dress, which means losing weight. To lose weight, Sara begins taking dieting pills (speed) and becomes horribly addicted. In the same summer, her son Harry begins working as a drug dealer with his friend Tyrone. His goal is to help his girlfriend, Marion, afford her own business.

Come fall, though, Tyrone is arrested and the drug market is drying up. Frantic, poorer and addicted, Harry, Tyrone and Marion begin to do whatever it takes to score drugs to get high and make money, ruining everything in their lives in the process.

Just when I thought I had seen Jennifer Connelly in the most depressing movie I could see her in, with The House Of Sand And Fog (reviewed here!) I find out about and witness Requiem For A Dream. Requiem For A Dream is an unrelenting movie that I can only describe as a psychologically horrific masterpiece by director and writer Darren Aronofsky and writer Hubert Selby Jr. Aronofsky reminds the viewer what great direction can do. Great direction TELLS the story the director wants to convey, using the full medium to its greatest advantage. Aronofsky does this masterfully by blending together the lives and drug use of Sara, Harry and Marion.

I finished watching Requiem For A Dream approximately fifteen minutes ago and I'm writing my review now because I do not want to ruminate on the film. I intend to erase it from my memory. That's how powerful the imagery was. Aronofsky is explicit with the drug-use imagery and the repetition of it combined with the mixing of the scenes of legal and illegal drug use create a nightmarish cinematic landscape that is boring into my brain.

The acting in Requiem For A Dream is utterly convincing. Ellen Burstyn, who I loved in the inspirational The Spitfire Grill (reviewed here!), is captivating in her descent as Sara. She makes full use of her body language and facial expressions to convey paranoia and loneliness. Her acting is tremendous here; there is not a shred of strength of character in her that she has used in other characters she has played.

Jared Leto is creepy and good as Harry. Perhaps the big acting surprise was Marlon Wayans. The Wayans brothers are most known for comedy and Marlon here has no humor as Tyrone. He's cold, calculating and dramatically heavy. That he did not win any awards for his portrayal (he was nominated for several) is too bad.

Jennifer Connelly . . . sigh. I suppose once you've watched Connelly play a character who degenerates into a crackwhore, you've pretty much seen everything an actor can do. Watching Connelly made me sad. There's no other way to say it. Her performance is wrenching and depressing.

I can take depressing movies, but I want there to be something to come back to, something to make it worthwhile. Something that catches me. The direction here is good, but all of the characters are unredeemably miserable. I feel foul having watched this movie and that's why I know it was well-made.

I think this movie is suitable only as part of a "scared straight" program for 12 year-olds with reinforcement with clips from the latter half of the movie every six months until they are terrified adults who never use drugs. Outside that, no one deserves to be subjected to this movie.

For something far more entertaining and overall better, try Magnolia (reviewed here!). Now I'm off to take a shower and have some ice cream and forget I ever saw this movie.

Honestly, though, I doubt I'll be able to sleep.

For other films that are well-made, but not worth watching, check out my reviews of:
Hard Candy
An American Crime
The Other Woman

8/10 (Not recommended!)

For other film reviews, please visit my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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"Rate This, You Fascists!" The Joys Of Investigating The MPAA In This Film Is Not Yet Rated

The Good: Well researched, Thorough, Interesting observations, Clever premise, Worthwhile argument
The Bad: Ultimately pointless for the effort, Repetitive DVD features
The Basics: In a decent documentary, Kirby Dick outs the members of the MPAA as part of a larger quest to explore how and why films receive ratings in the U.S.


Given the ridiculous number of films I watch and review as a professional reviewer and fan of cinema as an art form, it's very rare that I actually read reviews written by other people. I'm a strong believer in the unhindered viewing, which is ironic because if all of you stopped reading my reviews, I could not afford to see anything else ever. So, thank you for not sharing in my tragic fault. I did, however, read a review last year of This Film Is Not Yet Rated and I recall reading the glowing review praising Kirby Dick's latest cinematic endeavor. The reviewer admitted a biased toward Dick and I was intrigued because I had never heard of the director/documentarian. Still, the subject of the film being reviewed made This Film Is Not Yet Rated pretty much essential for me to watch.

Having learned of many tales of directors having films cut due to content deemed too explicit by the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America), Kirby Dick attempts to learn as much about the organization as possible. This task is made near impossible as the members of the MPAA are kept secret. In response to the secrecy that veils the organization, Dick hires a private detective and hunts down the board of parents who decide what films in the United States are rated. Dick soon finds that the task is not impossible, the MPAA is not made up of people who strictly meet the stated guidelines of the organization and that his film, like many of the filmmakers he interviewed, is headed for a battle . . . with the MPAA.

This Film Is Not Yet Rated is a movie with an excellent premise, great supporting information and a worthy objective that simply does not stick the landing. That is to say that the movie has an excellent idea and even a decent execution of its vision, but it does not bring the point home in a way that seals the deal. It leaves the viewer wishing for a little more. It has the feeling of not quite living up to its potential.

The divergence between the concept and the failed execution comes when the quest to uncover the identities of those in the MPAA is actually achieved. Dick reveals the identities of the 2005 MPAA reviewing board, a class that had supposedly changed by the time the film was released in 2006. The work was admirable, but the result was pointless. The current members of the secret board are secret.

But the exercise is not folly. Dick discovers that the group whose mission statement claims the reviewing board is made up of parents with children in a certain age group with limited terms for their tenure on the board is anything but. In determining the identities of those involved, Dick discovers that the MPAA is not being honest about its panel; members serve longer than their terms, are not parents and/or do not have children within the specified age groups. In exposing the group for its flaws or its fraud, Dick effectively raises the debate from a group of directors complaining about their work being censored to a legitimate critique of the secret organization gutting their content.

Dick's most persuasive arguments against the MPAA come in the form of the interviews with directors whose work have been edited in order to conform with the wishes of the MPAA. Directors like Kevin Smith, Darren Aronofsky, and Kimberly Peirce discuss their films and how they were hit with NC-17 ratings by the MPAA and compelled to alter their films to make them marketable. The film does an excellent job exploring how the NC-17 is a death knell for films and how directors are often ordered by the studio to make sure the film falls within a certain rating.

Dick and the directors he interviews quickly postulate and empirically prove several concepts dealing with how films are rated, including: the MPAA is more likely to restrict content based more on nudity/sex as opposed to violence, the MPAA is more prejudiced against homosexual acts than heterosexual ones, and the lack of ability to appeal a film and cite cinematic precedent allows the MPAA to maintain power and control over the filmmakers and their films.

Dick also deftly diffused the MPAA argument that they do not censor films by exploring the business ramifications of movies that have received an NC-17 rating. Outside the quest to discover the identities of the members of the ratings board of the MPAA, this is a remarkably informative documentary.

Dick is an unobtrusive documentarian, maintaining a dialogue and presence more akin to Michael Moore's presence in Fahrenheit 9/11 (reviewed here!) than, say, Moore's presence in Roger And Me. As odd as it may seem, until the very end, Dick does not make the movie about himself, his views or his agenda, instead making a classic argument against censorship and for individual responsibility.

His argument is rather effective and I have to say that he manages to keep the film entertaining and informative. The interviews are decent and the only weakness in the opening of the film where directors are telling their stories of fights with the MPAA is that there could have been more of them for my tastes.

On the DVD, the film looks good and the commentary track is as insightful and enjoyable as the actual feature. Before this film, I had not seen a point to a commentary track on a documentary, but on This Film Is Not Yet Rated, it works. The only problem is that virtually all of the other DVD bonus features mirror the commentary track, so if one listens to all of the commentary and watches all of the features, some of the behind-the-scenes stories are told three times (or more).

It's not enough to prevent me from recommending the film, but it is enough to plunge the DVD presentation down into more average territory. Still, it's a worthwhile movie to watch and certainly an important one for those who are concerned about the erosion of our civil liberties and the notion of artistic freedom.

For other documentaries, please check out my reviews of:
The Fog Of War
Who Killed The Electric Car?
Shut Up And Sing

6.5/10

For other film reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Darren Aronofsky Presents 2001: The Next Generation With The Fountain

The Good: Well acted, Interesting characters, Moments of mood, Scope, Effects
The Bad: Much of the mood, DVD extras
The Basics: When Tomas goes on a quest for the Tree of Life, he finds himself bound to a love that lasts a millennia in a slow, but pretty awesome cinematic experience.


Spike Feresten, a former writer for Seinfeld, had a late night show on Fox in the illustrious midnight-after-MadTV-on-Saturday timeslot. On his appropriately titled Talkshow With Spike Feresten, he had a bit called "Comedy For Stoners," where after refusing to condone drug use he provides a sketch that could truly only be appreciated by someone who was high. I mention this at the outset of my review for The Fountain because while being a bit of a prude against drugs myself, I think this film might be benefited by some form of mind-altering substance in order to get the most out of it. Perhaps the tagline, instead of "What If You Could Live Forever?," should have been, "If You Fondly Remember Seeing 2001 Baked.'" It certainly couldn't have hurt the film's grosses.

When I was going through a patch of watching films recently and not getting around to reviewing them right away, I was suddenly barraged with requests by people in my life to tell them what The Fountain, now on DVD was actually about. This recent film by Darren Aronofsky, who previously bored me with Pi, left me ambivalent with Black Swan (reviewed here!) and revolted me completely with his magnificent, if overwhelming Requiem For A Dream, is billed as a science fiction masterpiece in the vein of Stanley Kubrick's cinematic interpretation of 2001: A Space Odyssey and it certainly lives up to that reputation. Yes, it's a bit slow.

In the 1500s, Spain's Queen Isabel is beset by the forces of the Grand Inquisitor. As her empire falls under the yolk of the Inquisitor and fear overcomes her lands, she turns to Tomas, a Conquistador who she believes can help save Spain. Queen Isabel sends Tomas to the New World on a quest to find the Tree of Life amid the Mayans. Five hundred years later, Dr. Tom Creo, is searching desperately for a cure to an incurable cancer and he strikes on using the bark from a tree only he knows about. As he works to save the woman he loves, his wife Izzi, she works on a novel describing Tom's past and his future, a future that will take him to the birthplace of stars in an attempt to reincarnate the love of his life.

The Fountain, as I've explained to several people face to face, is a story that is told in a nonlinear fashion and that seems to be what throws a lot of people. In the year 2500, Tom is sailing through space with the Tree of Life toward the birthplace of stars. His little treeship is sailing along and he is having hallucinations of Izzi, his long-dead wife. In his memories of Izzi, he recalls her novel, which just happened to be the story of Tom's life, including his quest five hundred years before to find the Tree of Life and projecting the reality he is in at that moment, traveling to the birthplace of stars. Once one accepts that things are happening out of order and that Tom is an immortal, there is little truly open for debate in the film.

Yes, outside the narrative structure and the supernatural immortality and ability for Izzi to reincarnate at five hundred year intervals and somehow know Tomas's past and future, it's a remarkably straightforward film. What many people may have problems with is that this is the classic highbrow science fiction story that we do not see frequently in United States cinema any longer. Aronofsky is trying to make a thinking piece, filled with ambiguity resulting in something the viewer has to wrestle with or contemplate. It's not intended to be something that gives all of the answers to the viewer, more to inspire the asking of questions.

In that regard, it's something of a mystery why Aronofsky edited the film so it could get a PG-13 rating. This is not a movie that is being marketed toward the 13 - 18 crowd, so cutting it for content (it originally was given an "R") seems almost as esoteric as the final cut. This is science fiction - and cinema! - for people who want to experience a cinematic experience, not simply be entertained or watch big explosions on a big screen. It's not that type of film.

The Fountain is basically a character study and that is where it succeeds. Tomas or Tom or Tommy is a compelling protagonist who lives his immortal life obsessed with one great love. He never gives up on his love for Isabel or Izzi and as a result, the film effectively implies much of what the viewer never sees. In short, Tom is living his life for one great love. How do we know it is great? We see the effect it has on him. Instead of belaboring the film with defining just what Tom's love is and how deep it goes, the viewer is left to understand that through the lengths he goes for that love. And that works quite well to inform the viewer.

After all, how many men would spend a thousand years obsessing on the same woman, leaving all sense of reality behind to attempt to rescue her and rebirth her in the one place in the galaxy that might actually be possible? Short list of men, long list of women who might want said man to turn their attention to her.

Isabel is suitably distant as queen and her reincarnated self as Izzi is wonderfully emotive, expressive and loving; everything that was not fulfilled by Tomas's relationship with Isabel is evident in Tom's relationship with Izzi. The figment Tom sees while aboard the treeship is his own hallucination, memories of the woman from five hundred years prior, so her appearance then is less an expression of her character and more a reflection on Tom's. Izzi is interesting, though it is clearly Tom who dominates this story and the expression of love director Aronofsky is exploring.

Tomas is played by Hugh Jackman and this might well be his most original performance on screen since Scoop. Here, Jackman is frequently frustrated, portraying his character in all three times as a man almost always on edge. Maintaining that level of emotional uncertainty to evoke a strongly unsettling quality is not easy, but Jackman makes it seem effortless. He performs without the wry wit of his character from Scoop and without the fury he must maintain as Wolverine in the X-Men films. He is articulate, humble, charming and he bears a broken quality through much of the film that helps define his character as unlike any he has ever played.

The incarnations of Isabel are portrayed by Rachel Weisz. Right around the time I saw The Fountain, I saw Weisz in Constantine. Weisz proves her ability to act by creating an entirely different - and more convincing - persona as Isabel than she did in her role in Constantine. As Isabel, she is regal, strong and distant in the way one expects a monarch - especially a besieged one - to act. He has presence in the role and is convincing. Similarly, as Izzi, she is loving, accessible and entirely human, which fits her character perfectly. Married to Aronofsky, the director clearly knew how to get the best of out her and her performance in The Fountain shines.

The film is not going to satisfy everyone. This is definitely a piece for those who can watch films on a metaphorical level instead of a literal one. The narrative technique can be confusing and it is a strongly visual film, so it needs to be watched and paid attention to. Aronofsky and his crew are of little help; there is no commentary track on the DVD. Instead, there is a featurette (six featurettes in one) that focuses on the production challenges associated with making the film, but not much more. There is also the theatrical trailer for The Fountain. This is a very light DVD when it comes to extras and that is bound to disappoint anyone seriously confused by the work.

For other works with Rachel Weisz, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Definitely, Maybe
Envy
The Mummy Returns
The Mummy

7/10

For other food reviews, please be sure to visit my index page on the subject by clicking here!

© 2011, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

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In Pursuit Of The Illusive Orgasm: Lechers, Blood And Mother Issues Rule Black Swan

The Good: Acting, Costumes, Themes
The Bad: Themes are beat into the viewer’s head, Characters are impossible to empathize with, Direction style is annoying, Pacing drags plot.
The Basics: Black Swan strikes me as a vain acting exercise as the protagonist, Nina, descends into mental illness while the director shakes the camera.


One of the things I have always loathed about taking legitimate (real, paying) work is how it cuts into my review time. My current employment is with the Federal Government away from home. So, in addition to being two hours away from my loving wife each night, I am an hour and a half (each way) commute to the job I am doing. Because I have been training for the last month, I am severely behind with catching movies in theaters (forget about the preview screenings I am used to attending!). So, when my job changed up the hours radically (11 – 7:30 to 3 – 11:30), I decided to view this as an opportunity to catch up on a movie or two that I have actually wanted to see. The first of those is Black Swan.

Going into Black Swan all I actually knew about the film was that it was the first of a crapton of films starring Natalie Portman that are hitting theaters (I swear, she is this year’s Seth Rogan as far as putting movies out!) and that it was a thriller set in the ballet world. I had only seen a single trailer for it and it seemed a lot like the trailer for Single White Female. Even so, I went into Black Swan very excited for the movie.

Nina Sayers is working for a prominent ballet company, living with her oppressive mother and trying to get the lead in the next production, which is Swan Lake. Nina suffers from some element of mental disorder where she scratches herself, much to her mother’s dismay. Nina returns to the ballet where the director, Thomas, is casting the new lead. As Beth, the prior darling of Thomas, is disqualified from the lead, Nina meets Lily, who is not as repressed as Nina is and lacks her technical precision. After being provoked by Thomas, Nina gets the lead, though the director believes Nina is ideal only for the role of the White Swan in the play.

After Beth attempts to kill herself, with Nina having been publicly presented as the Company’s new hope, Thomas pushes Nina to lose herself in the role. This troubles Nina, who has a mastery of technique, but is so driven that she cannot connote the Black Swan’s emotion and passion. She shares her concerns with Lily, who shares them with Thomas, much to Nina’s annoyance. When Lily visits to apologize, the pair goes out on the town and Nina finds herself threatened by Lily’s talent on stage and her fears that Lily is in a relationship with Thomas. As the premiere looms, Nina’s insecurities take over and she descends into madness which is not alleviated by her mother’s actions.

My wife would probably find it astonishing that I am not recommending a film with two Hollywood beautiful women making out and having sex, but there it is. I’ll fly in the face of popular critical opinion with Black Swan and say that this film is not worth seeing. I have no problem making such a recommendation (don’t believe in my independence as a reviewer, check out my review of Gone With The Wind, here!) because from early in the film when the camera’s frenetic movements were distracting, I found myself more annoyed than pleased with or engaged by the film. Black Swan is essentially in the same niche as A Beautiful Mind or The Soloist; it’s a mental illness film. But unlike The Soloist, I found I did not care about the main characters. Indeed, by the time the pills came out, I lost all empathy I might have had for them.

The fundamental problem with Black Swan is that the movie is filmed in an annoying way and the characters are not at all interesting. The filming of the movie is troubling. Director Darren Aronofsky seems obsessed with keeping the camera moving even when his subjects are moving in dynamic and vibrant patterns. The result is a nauseating visual style that confuses the narrative more than it expresses anything germane to the characters.

The seasoned movie viewer will also be disappointed by the plethora of early clues given out that play heavily on the idea that Nina is mentally ill. Because the scratches are evident in the first scene, the viewer knows that Nina suffers some form of disorder and it does not take long before her hallucinations are illustrated and her mother punishes her for things like scratching. The mother issues play off the sense of dedication Nina possesses to become technically flawless, but explain the socially crippled nature of the character that allows her to accept the creepy manipulations of Thomas.

And therein lay one of the many problems with Black Swan for me. Thomas is a predictably lecherous director who had been sleeping with Beth and whose attempts to get Nina to access her passion may be seen as some quirky director trick to access her passion or as a genuinely smarmy character defect. Either Thomas is a brilliant director whose methods attempt to push Nina into her best performance ever or he’s a manipulative jerk using his job to score with ballerinas. The fundamental problem with Black Swan in this part of the film is that I did not care one way or the other on the matter. Nina seems to accept Thomas’s behavior as normal for the setting, despite her mother, Lily and Beth at various times afford her opportunities to distance herself from him. And because the ambiguity exists, I found I didn’t care. As soon as Thomas began probing Nina for answers on her intimate secrets, I was prepared to be disappointed if she slept with him. Conversely, if the creepy questions and inappropriate touching was actually professionally motivated as a quirky artist thing, I wanted to see that the end result worked and Nina gave an incredible performance that tapped into her real passion.

At the end, though, I felt that all the manipulations accomplished was to create an excuse to get Nina into sexually explicit positions and conversations. Nina begins chasing an orgasm and through Lily she has the potential to achieve that and tap into the primal passion Thomas insists she needs. But again, here the style severely dampens the story and the effect. Much of Nina’s sexual exploration is frenetically shot and mixed with disturbing visions. Nina’s mental illness plays even into her sexual escapades and while that rings true for reality, it is hardly something I want to watch when I’m going to the movies. In other words, I’m not one for the current acceptance of sexual titillation mixed with disturbing violence, gore or other imagery. The disturbing always undoes the sensuality and in Black Swan it is undone surprisingly early in the film.

What Black Swan does pull off well is the acting. While I might not have been able to continue empathizing with Nina, despite my love of stories about the artist and their process, and Lily is never developed to the point where she is a viable character on her own (regardless of how the film ended – no spoilers here – I spent much of the film emotionally preparing myself for the idea that Lily might well be a figment of Nina’s imagination, an idea helped along by the overbearing white/black color motif used between Nina and Lily throughout the movie), the acting in Black Swan is top notch. Natalie Portman is convincing as a young woman so dedicated to her craft that she is socially stunted and passionless in many ways. Portman is absolutely able to set her face to portray the determination and professionalism to make her believably a ballerina of such skill and ability. Portman also illustrates from the outset that Nina is not emotionally aware or expressive, which makes the viewer believe completely that Thomas would see that deficiency in her. Portman’s expressiveness peaks early, though; she is amazingly precise in her deliveries in the wake of Nina blowing her audition with Thomas and the vulnerability she expresses with her mother makes her human for, arguably, the only time in the movie. The viewer believes that Nina would be the result of a mother who refers to her as the “most dedicated” dancer in the company, instead of “the best.” That is because of Portman’s performance.

Mila Kunis plays off Portman quite well, but she is given almost nothing to do on her own. Instead, Kunis is presented frequently as the anti-Portman and she is not able to tap into the full energy that she has exhibited on other programs. Kunis succeeds in her supporting role because she has a fearless quality in her performance that makes Lily a viable foil. Kunis deserves some credit for her ability to connote fearlessness with an effortless grace. Similarly, Thomas is well played by Vincent Cassel because he was unsettling almost every moment he was on screen.

But adding it all up, Black Swan does not have enough to hold it together or recommend it. The film looks sloppy and the director relies on far too many abrupt reversals early on with fast, abrupt stops that soon become predictable or formulaic. And the initial intrigue presented by Thomas, that the story will explore the virginal girl trapped within the swan’s body needing true love to free her (Swan Lake as Thomas describes it) goes unrealized as the story spirals down into the tale of artist madness. Despite the stylistic elements that worked – costumes, a few moments of sensuality – the film is ultimately more sloppy than fresh or original. I felt like I had seen too much of it before and by the time the movie turned in a way that was even mildly intriguing, I no longer cared. That is the death knell of a film, but it is where Black Swan ultimately landed.

For other works featuring Natalie Portman, check out my reviews of:
Thor
No Strings Attached
The Star Wars Saga

4/10

For other film reviews, please be sure to visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.


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