Barrett’s Awards Season Review: ‘Black Swan’ is a Dark, Disturbing Masterpiece

GRADE: A+

In a year when Inception appears to be the culmination of Christopher Nolan’s career work, resulting in his finest film and what some people consider to be his “masterpiece,” Darren Aronofsky is following a similar path with his brilliant, incomparable psycho-ballet thriller, Black Swan. The film is one of the most intensely heart-wrenching and mind-bending experiences I’ve had at the theaters. As the film’s mesmerizing ending crescendos into its climax, when the credits started to roll, I was pinned into my seat. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. My jaw was dropped, and I wanted to cry at the beautiful art I had just witnessed. Darren Aronofsky has used bits from each of his previous films to create a truly unforgettable film that should be a serious contender this awards season, Natalie Portman especially. For me, Black Swan is “perfect” and it is Aronofsky’s masterpiece.

Before you start raising eye-brows about this initial gushing, I will note that this is only the second A+ grade that I’ve given for a movie here on The Mash, Inception being the other. So it’s not like I throw around that grade lightly. Anyway, to the review…

Like all great psychological thrillers, the story of Black Swan is a simple one, but is accompanied by many nuances and complexities that make it unique. In the film, Natalie Portman plays Nina Sayers, a talented and dedicated ballerina performing in the New York Ballet Company. During this upcoming ballet season, the company is rolling out it’s new take on the classic tale of Swan Lake. The company’s previous headlining star Beth (Winona Ryder) is being pushed out of the spotlight due to old age, allowing some new blood to take her place in the coveted lead role as Swan Queen.

Nina desperately wants this new role, but has trouble convincing her peers and the director Toma (Vincent Cassel) that she can handle the job; as her technique is flawless, but her fear of truly “letting go” on stage prevents her from inhabiting the duel sides of the Swan Queen; the White Swan, the symbol of good and lightness, and the Black Swan, the symbol of evil and darkness.

With the mounting pressure of seeking “perfection” on stage, Nina slowly begins to unravel emotionally and psychologically. The fact that Toma’s sexual advances and unrelenting scrutiny of her skills, passion and abilities doesn’t help much either. She then gets some surprising solace and support from fellow dancer Lilly (Mila Kunis), who appears on screen to help Nina deal with this pressure via encouraging sentiment. She also provides Nina with some seriously graphic sexual stimuli, as her inability to “seduce the audience” is what is holding her back from “becoming” the Black Swan. And when I mean graphic sexual stimuli, I mean GRAPHIC. It is intensely erotic.  But does Lilly have ulterior motives? Is she trying to steal the role of Swan Queen that Nina is practically killing herself over? These are the questions that propel Nina into the depths of darkness and madness.

The performances in the film are top-notch across the board, but Portman’s transcendence into Nina Sayers, whose increasingly distorted view of reality throughout the film, is a truly powerful thing to behold.  Her desperation to be “perfect” and the lengths at which she goes to hide her unraveling psychological state is disturbing, tragic and heart-breaking. If she does not walk on stage at the Oscars in two months time to accept the statue for Best Actress, I will have lost all faith in the Academy. This is the performance of a lifetime, and Portman completely knocks it out of the park. Cassell and Kunis are fantastic as well, and I could also see a Best Supporting Actress nomination for Barbara Hershey, who plays Nina’s mother; a very important character who acts as both a figure of comfort and safety, but who also simultaneously aides in Nina’s increasing psychosis.

Darren Aronofsky’s direction is absolutely flawless. He has created an atmosphere of darkness and tragedy that will go unrivaled this year and for years to come. The cinematography is breathtaking. The script is brilliant. Aronofsky plunges the audience into is a seriously scary world, and one that I will never forget.

It’s hard to surmise my feelings towards this film, as it could be categorized in many facets. It’s one part drama, one part thriller, and I would even go as to say it is one part psychological-horror.  I am still haunted by some of the dark and disturbing images from this film. Throughout the last hour or so, it is so unbearably tense, that at times, I forgot to breathe.

Black Swan is seriously heavy stuff, people. But it is an example of the true power of cinema. I am absolutely going back to see it again, and I encourage, nay I IMPLORE you, to see it for yourself.

What Should You Do? See. This. Film.