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There is a kind of beauty in a film that isn’t meant to be fully understood by the audience. A truly talented director can take a film, knowing it will be more than the audience can handle and make it entertaining regardless. Pi is such a film.

Perhaps, Pi eludes me somewhat as I fail at anything mathematic, but it was nonetheless arresting. What draws me in to Pi is what draws me into every Aronofsky film – he’s making a film without concern that the viewer may not understand, he simply wants us to be drawn in and to experience.

Every Aronofsky film is unique and worth whatever effort you have to put in to finding it.

Trying to describe an Aronofsky film can be almost as difficult as explaining a Pollack painting to someone who’s expecting a Monet – artists that think outside the box have a way of affecting their viewer more than any description can accurately portray. Black Swan is definitely one of those films, a story that might be as simply described as the tale of a ballerina who is pushing herself so hard towards perfection that she loses her grip on reality around her, and yet Aronofsky artfully layers the film to the extent that no simple description can capture the true beauty of this film.

Natalie Portman plays Nina, the lead role in Black Swan and though she’s been amazing me with her performances since Leon, she reaches new depths in this role; it’s one of the most devastating and brutal performances I’ve seen on screen – but that’s something Aronofsky seems to excel at fostering in his films. Portman literally breaks the boundaries of sanity before the audiences eyes as she transforms from shy core member, to dual-hearted lead.

Mila Kunis also stars as Lily, the free-spirited dancer who Nina envies as she outwardly embodies everything that Nina wishes to become. Over the past few years I’ve gained great respect for Kunis as an actor, as she seems to have grown with every role I’ve seen her in. In Black Swan she manages to be both daring, brash and domineering and yet she holds your attention on screen just as thoroughly as Portman.

Black Swan owes something very specific to Hitchcock – the ability to lie to the audience. Perhaps what makes Black Swan so tense and thrilling is that as the film progresses you are never sure if what is happening on screen is real, or if it is happening in Nina’s mind; it’s a powerful tribute to the director that we stay intrigued by this, because it brings us into Nina’s plight, we can’t trust what’s going on any more than Nina can. However, when the credits finally roll all that matters is that you’ve been pinned to your seat for the better part of two hours, anxious to see what will happen to Nina.

What I love about an Aronofsky film, including Black Swan is that you can tell every inch of every frame matters to Aronofsky. The smallest details are added together to be the most important, from the textures of fabric in wardrobe, to small visual effects that may go unnoticed by most of the audience. Aronofsky has as way of melding fantasy and reality in a way that makes the fantasy look absolutely real, and when necessary makes the reality look like the dream. Aronofsky has never done a film that hasn’t been powerful and dynamic – he’s a director with a clear voice and style, one that firmly belongs in cinema and I am sure his films will be some of the many that film scholars discuss for years to come.





Director: Darren Aronofsky


Nina: I had the craziest dream last night about a girl who has turned into a swan, but her prince falls for the wrong girl and she kills herself.

Anyone who has seen The Fountain knows that you would never describe Aronofsky's work as simple or mainstream; that being said, The Wrester is by far Aronofsky’s most simple and mainstream story even though it is really nothing of the sort.

The Wrestler is the beautifully told tale of Randy “The Ram” a pro wrestler that hit it big in the 80’s, but the film is not about him then, it’s about him now – it’s been 20 years since his glory days and he is now living in poverty and obscurity. The only thing Randy has been able to hold onto is his love of wrestling and the charge he gets from the crowd so he continues to wrestle in any match he can find. The only problem is that the only part of his life that Randy understands and can control is his wrestling and when he tries to change that balance and have a life outside of wrestling and move past his days in the ring he is unable to do so.

In classic Aronofsky fashion this film is so layered that my brother and I were able to debate for quite awhile what the subtext in the film was, and even though we each had different thoughts neither of us could prove the other wrong.

While this is the most mainstream and easily digested of all Darren Aronofsky’s tales it is by no means a flat story and used many of the themes he loves to deal with. This film deals with aging, materialism, family and a character that seeks to regain prominence. Thematically I would say it is closest to Requiem for a Dream - just not nearly as disturbing or depressing.

One thing that truly makes Aronofsky’s films stand out from some other contemporary filmmakers is the performances he is able to get out of his actors and The Wrestler shows this yet again primarily through Mickey Rourke as Randy. I can honestly say that Rourke deserves an Oscar nomination for this film, and I had no idea he was capable of the sheer raw emotion he brings to this film.

I know that The Wrestler will not be a box office smash, it will actually probably piss off a lot of people that see it. However, for those that want to see a moving, relevant film I do recommend it.

Director: Darren Aronofsky
Writer: Robert D. Siegel
Randy “The Ram”: Mickey Rourke
Cassidy: Marisa Tomei
Stephenie: Evan Rachel Wood