Black Swan...

There’s something particularly affecting about the blurring of the boundary between what’s real and what’s not. About feeling your own sense of balance start to slip, about witnessing the erosion of your own self assuredness and the rise of fears and doubts that before would have seemed patently unreasonable, but now carry an inexplicable weight that can fall so heavily across your chest. 

Excuse my verbosity, but I know I’ve been there, and I assume many of you have too. 

In fiction, such descents into madness have a rich history. In the pitiable likes of Shakespeare’s Ophelia and Lady Macbeth, to those of A Street Car Named Desire’s faded southern belle Blanche DuBois and the protagonist Sylvia Plath so vividly crafted in the The Bell Jar, ¹ it’s clear that if we witness where such people began, it can make it all the more where tragic when we see where they end up.²

I think it’s safe to say we can add Black Swan’s Nina Sayers to the list. 

Natalie Portman’s turn as Nina is astounding. She is the heart of the film, as the viewer experiences her journey toward the opening of her ballet company’s production of Swan Lake alongside her descent into nightmarish fervor. 

In a way, Black Swan moves into the area of the unreliable narrator, a story telling device in which it is unclear what is happening and what is not, whether what you are seeing can be trusted, or whether it is simply some kind of dream or hallucination. 

This is a plot device that can prove disastrous if badly used, but here it is used expertly. In the tradition of Jacob’s Ladder, a film quite similar in structure to Black Swan, this blurred line of the real and unreal proves to be the main drive of the film and produces all aspects of it that could be called horror.

Really, I would say it is fair to call this a horror movie. It fits into other genres as well of course, and though it lacks a ton of blood and gore, I think it will be accepted by horror fans. 

Darren Aronofsky is a brilliant director. Requiem for a Dream is one of all time favourite movies, and Black Swan matches Requiem, if not exceeds it. The camera work is stunning, the production values are there, the performances are stellar, and the whole flow of the movie is so well conceived and visceral so as to almost unfold like a dream. 

That really is a thought that keeps come back to me. Black Swan really is probably the most dreamlike film I have ever seen. Equal parts dream and nightmare I suppose, both in content and mode of story telling. In a good way, too. It really evoked the kind of feeling in me that comes when you wake up from a nightmare and are so grateful that what transpired in your head did not truly transpire, but was only a dream. 

The whole experience proved quite affecting for me. The scariest parts for me centered around Nina’s mother. That has something to do with my own personal history but I think others will feel the same way I did about this aspect of the story too. 

I can assure you I’m not talking about one particularly disconcerting scene toward the beginning of the film involving Nina’s mother, but I can’t say more really without ruining it. If you’re curious about what I’m talking about here, ask me after you’ve seen the movie.

And do go see it. It’s one of those movies that people will talk about, not just because of the awards buzz surrounding it or its sex scenes, but because it is an emotionally affecting, intriguing and disturbing journey the likes of which movie goers don’t often get to experience. 

It is a film too, that is open for various interpretations. It as much a story of personal struggle as it is of sexual awakening. It is one woman’s nightmare as much as it is her self realization.

I try to avoid spoilers, and I think I usually do a pretty good job of it, but I feel that last part may have been a bit much. Whatever, I didn’t reveal anything more than was revealed in the first trailer. 

There are small things I suppose I could point out--little horror movie cliches, particularly involving the film’s use of mirrors--but they are easily swept away by the film as a whole. 

And as someone with a history of and appreciation for dance, this movie proved quite aesthetically pleasing. The dancing is filmed brilliantly and I really do admire Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis and the rest of the cast for the effort they put into their roles. 

From the rehearsals, to a particularly evocative strobing club dance scene, to the final performance, it was all quite splendidly filmed and made me slightly nostalgic for my younger years. 

Anyhow, go see this film. An instruction worth repeating. Best dream I’ve had in a while. Or best film I’ve seen in a while? I’m getting confused.

Anyway, I give this film 4.75 out of 5, feathered, bleeding and hang-nailed stuck thumbs up for totally engrossing me in a nightmarish journey to a place I’m not quite sure of. 

xoxo

D-bag

¹The Bell Jar is quite the novel and its protagonist Esther Greenwood’s descent into what could be called madness is widely believed to parallel author Sylvia Plath’s own. Tragically, Plath killed herself a month after the novel’s first publication. 

²Interesting that all of the characters I was able to think of were women, as is Black Swan’s Nina. I hope this observation has been explored more thoroughly by others than it has been here.