"UNDER ANY REASONABLE DEFINITION, IT'S A HORROR FILM": That's the quote from Devin McCullen here which I had in mind upon attending Black Swan last night, and it's an accurate one. This is a film which starts off as an anvillicious, overwhelmingly formulaic black-and-white (literally) drama (seriously, I starting calling out lines before they happened) about The Virginal, Always In Control Girl Who Needs To Loosen Up which gradually, and then completely embraces its freaky side. Oh, yes, it does, and this is decidedly not a sequel to the beloved-in-these-parts Center Stage. This is one intense, occasionally ludicrous film that eventually wins you over through its commitment to its universe and the intensity of Natalie Portman's and Barbara Hershey's performances. (Full spoilers in comments, because I know many here have seen it already.)
added: The House Next Door's Jason Bellamy and Ed Howard talk at length about this "outrageous, unrestrained, heavy-handed, horny opera."
1. The digital effects. Wow. The focus on skin, muscles, blood ...
ReplyDelete2. Was surprised by the ending only insofar as I expected her to leap where there was no mattress, not that.
3. Question: does the film need to be *that* anvil-heavy in the first half in the setup with the black/white/mirrors symbolism and the obviousness of the dialogue (yes, we get it: NATALIE NEEDS TO GET LAID) for the last act to work as effectively as it does?
5. Use of Winona Ryder: ironic or cruel?
ReplyDeleteI also expected her to leap and find no mattress there. But then I realized that this ending makes more sense. The White Swan leaps to her death purposefully, and a fall to the floor would have been an accident, not suicide.
ReplyDeleteTo answer question #4, I'll be wishy-washy and say that Nina had tendencies towards crazy from the start, but it was the performance that pushed her over the edge. She was living an intensely solitary existence - just dance, that apartment, and her mother, with all the vestiges of her childhood lying around. And she was already in pursuit of perfection. But being given this ultimate challenge, and everything that came with it - the pressure from her mother and company leader, the rivalry with Lily, her lack of sexual experience - pushed her over the edge.
And I thought the use of Winona Ryder was brilliant. The moment you saw her, you felt who she was - the past-her-prime performer, who has such talent but just can't get ther roles anymore. I thought she was excellent in her brief scenes.
I'm still not sure if I loved the film, but I can say that it's been a long, long while since I've seen anything like it, and two days later, I'm still thinking about it, and I know I will be for a while longer.
Total Fletch ripoff.
ReplyDeleteBut seriously, folks. Was there really a Lily at all? I guess I'm inclined to think that there was *a* Lily, even if Nina created a Lily Prime. (And she was pretty crazy to begin with -- presumably, Nina (as Lily Prime?) wrote "WHORE" on the mirror, which was right after the casting decision, yes?)
ReplyDeleteNice to be credited, although I was definitely influenced by an article Linda Holmes linked to a couple of weeks back. It was arguing that Black Swan and 127 Hours were both really horror films that were being presented as something else because horror movies can't be taken seriously for awards. I don't totally agree on 127 Hours, although it certainly has some elements of horror.
ReplyDeleteOne question I really wondered about was whether Nina's mother was actually in the audience at the end. I'm inclined to say that she wasn't, mostly because I'm not sure how Nina could have picked her out from up there on stage. But if she was there, then what the hell actually happened the last time Nina was at the apartment?
I admit I hadn't thought about the possibility that Lily was completely a figment of Nina's imagination. It does seem unlikely, but I'd have to watch the movie again to be sure. One thing I am sure of: While the "Was I good?" line probably would have gotten laughs with anyone playing Lily, it was right in Mila Kunis' wheelhouse.
Re Nina's mom: just another paranoid delusion and she was slamming an empty door against nothing?
ReplyDeleteEssay Question: What do we make of Aronofsky's casting of three Jewish actresses as the ballerinas?
Except for Ellen Burstyn and Marisa Tomei, Aronofsky always casts Jewish: Jennifer Connelly, Rachel Weisz, etc etc. Barbara Hershey, also Jewish.
ReplyDeleteI thought Lily was a delusion.
The reason I thought that there was probably *a* Lily was that he's very careful not to have anyone other than Nina acknowledge Lily Prime (e.g., Nina's mother never acknowledges her, and you can read the scene with the knock at the door as though some random person knocked and her mom opened the door to find nobody there at all). But we do see various people interact with the Lily that could reasonably be viewed as actually existing. Of course, it all depends on just how mad Nina is -- she could be inventing those interactions as well.
ReplyDeleteIf Lily doesn't exist, where does Nina get the drugs? And does she just flirt with those two guys at the bar on her own?
ReplyDeleteI saw an interview with Portman (maybe on David Poland's blog?) where the interviewer said he thought that Nina didn't really die, and that the final scene was meant to be metaphorical. Portman agreed (and pointed out that in the last shot there is blood also on the inside of her legs as evidence of the metaphor). I'm not sure that reading works, and don't think that it really affects my enjoyment of the film, but thought it worth mentioning.
ReplyDelete[threadjack relating to today's ridiculously awesome outcome of another bird-related piece of entertainment, which was also a horror show at times, deleted]
Don't know about the drugs, but she did tell her mother that she, uh, slept with both of them. (I'm inclined to believe there is SOME Lily. Though who knows...)
ReplyDeleteI'm glad I'm not the only person who thought this movie was a lot like Showgirls.
ReplyDeleteTo that point, how do we know Nina took anything? She refused the initial pill. It looks like Lily spikes a drink, she takes what she thinks is the spiked drink, but it's all circumstantial.
ReplyDeleteOr: if Lily doesn't exist, did one of the guys spike the drink?
ReplyDeleteI lean towards there actually being a Lily, but one who was actually sincere when she tried to befriend/be decent to Nina. The scene where Thomas "goes easy" on Nina because Lily told him Nina's having a problem with stress is what makes me think she probably existed. Thomas also didn't react, "WTF?" when they had that conversation about the understudy near the end. (Yeah, those could have been hallucinations, but I don't think so.) My husband is of the belief that there is no Lily, and we had a long discussion afterwards about what Nina's DSM-IV diagnos(i/e)s would be. I'm also inclined to think she doesn't actually die at the end.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I am pretty sure someone brought a kid to see this when we went. Might have just been a really short adult, but...
Watching Mila Kunis plow through a cheeseburger made me really want a cheeseburger. It was good.
ReplyDeleteWe had Darren Aronofsky, Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis and Barbara Hershey at our screening series for a Q & A and Aronofskey described the movie as a werewolf movie. It was a really interesting Q & A (clips of which, including the aforementioned, can be seen here.)
ReplyDeletePersonally this movie was one I'm glad I saw, and I think Portman deserves all the accolades she's getting for her performance, but I don't know that I'd see it again. Just a little too much of the weird and crazy for me. Although, I say this back to back with 127 Hours before they came out and so I may also have been reeling from basically 4 hours of intensity in really different ways.
I think there was *a* Lily, but the dark, psycho Lily was someone that was a figment of Nina's imagination and/or psychosis. If I'm remembering correctly, didn't the company director make a comment to Nina about her dancing, how raw and abandoned it was? I'm pretty sure he did.
ReplyDeleteI'm inclined to think there was a Lily although I considered the possibility that there was not.
ReplyDeleteMy biggest question was whether or not Nina's Lily sex dream was actually sex with her mother. Or was she hallucinating the whole thing? I also wondered if she killed her mother in the dressing room before the final dance.I was surprised to see Barbara Hershey in the audience.
I thought the costumes were beautiful and would see the movie again just to see the final dance scenes which I thought were really wonderful.