Black Swan - Aranofsky's next!

AlexanderC said:
I enjoyed it however I thought it suffered from several narrative structure problems. You learn very little about the characters other than that Portmans character wants to be a great dancer, that her mum is a bit nuts and that the instructor likes to **** alot and as a result I felt detached from the characters and felt like I was watching a dark Kafka adaptation where by im watching her metamorphosis but not feeling like anything is at stake.

There were sooo many plot lines which were not explored, like her relationship with her mother, with sex, boys, the other girls and her not eating. The film just felt shallow IMHO well made but very two dimensional and shallow.
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I saw this film tonight screened at my school, and I'm glad someone mentioned this - it's my opinion too. The only sure fire thing I can say about the film, though, is that it's definitely a psychological thriller. I felt the film could have been so much better, though, if it were more about the characters and not the psychology. This is why I love all of DA's other films and this is my least favorite of his. While I'm happy for him that he seems to be going 'mainstream,' I can't help but wish that his films were still like The Fountain or Requiem for a Dream in being pleasures only film aficionados could enjoy. Maybe my roomate's drunken girlfriend's ecstacy over Black Swan is affecting my opinion. ;)
 
I thought this was an excellent movie and that Natalie Portman thoroughly deserved her oscar. Anyone complaining that the film doesn't develop the secondary characters is completely missing the point of a film like this. Aronofsky made a purely subjective film that puts you completely in the head of its protagonist from first frame to last. We only know things about the other characters that she knows, and follow her on her descent into madness as she loses herself in her role. This type of film is not everyone's cup of tea but its not a failure on Aronofsky's part as an artist. I think he fully achieved what he set out to do, which is to show the psychological process a performer goes through when they fully commit to playing a role, a metamorphosis he wanted to show from the inside looking out. Pulling away from that to explore the other characters would have diluted its power.
 
While I agree with not truly exploring other characters was a fine idea for the film, and I understand completely your point, I think it suffers from characters that were two dimensional. For example, the mother. From my interpretation of her character, put in any situation, she would always act the same; stay home, rest. I was never surprised by anything she did, and therefore, her scenes added so little to the film. Her function was a door for Nina to unlock. Lily's function was completely internal to Nina; all we ever saw her do was exactly the opposite of what would lead to Nina playing her role in Swan Lake; took her out, drugged her, got the backup part, etc.

What would happen if Nina DIDN'T end up playing the Swan Queen? Personally, I didn't care if she did or didn't, because the film wasn't about that. It wasn't meant to make me care whether the protagonist got or did not get what she wanted and / or needed. How did it even hold our attention? By stories we think MIGHT develop. A competition between Lily and Nina for the top spot. A mother pushing her daughter to her limit to get the lead. A teacher trying to have an affair with a student. With all these possibilities, it stayed interesting, but nothing ever happened. Nina always had the lead in the ballet, from the beginning, and never relinquished it for a second. Her struggle was in trying to 'become' the black swan. And what happened in the end? Oh, she 'became' the black swan, literally.

I saw, in layers, how a performer transforms from the day she gets the part to the final performance in embodying a character. But something so literal is a far cry from the brilliance of The Fountain's metaphors. And not just that. The Fountain, as use for a comparison, though fantastic, was grounded in our world or a world familiar to us. Same as Black Swan. The difference is that in The Fountain, there was a character who wanted something, a cure, and if he didn't find that, he would lose the thing most important to him, his love. I go back to this: What would happen to Nina if she didn't get the lead, she'd cry? I didn't care.
 
The Fountain and Black Swan are two different films. Their stories have different needs and express their points in different ways. Nina's desire wasn't to get the lead, she gets it early on. Her drive is to be perfect, and she went to the ultimate lengths to get there. I can't make you care, all I can tell you is that I did. As a creative person whose lost themselves in their work and struggled for perfection, I found Nina's story compelling. Not every story needs a carrot and a stick to make you care. And she didn't literally become the Black Swan. That was a visual metaphor for how she felt at the climax. You can't look at a highly subjective film like this from the outside and take everything that happens at face value. Everything that is seen is something that is happening internally with Nina. It's like the difference between a novel told in the first person and the third person. The mother was two dimensional because we only saw her from Nina's point of view. Personally, I have my doubt as to wether the mother was ever really there. Nina displays many of the characteristics of someone suffering from a schizophrenic break from reality without ever knowing it, and the mother could have been a projection of her own subconscious guilt. But that's just my interpretation.
 
I find both The Fountain and Black Swan work best as descent-into-madness stories, but they're very distinctly *different* descent-into-madness stories.
 
Sad Max said:
I find both The Fountain and Black Swan work best as descent-into-madness stories, but they're very distinctly *different* descent-into-madness stories.
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These two films and Pi are kind of a trilogy of sorts I guess. They are about characters striving to achieve some kind of perfection, whether it's mathematical (Pi), scientific (The Fountain), or artistic (Black Swan). Even Requiem can be seen as characters striving for the perfect high, although that might be a stretch.

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To extend this to The Wrestler, I think that film is about what's on the other side. You have a character who was once perfect at his craft and paid the price for that, and is now a broken down shell of his former self. He's given up on the ideal of perfection, both in and out of the ring, and is merely finding joy in being able to perform again, no matter the outcome.
 
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What people tend to gloss over is that even though Nina's mother Erica pushes her, she's at the same time living vicariously through her daughter and in a projected competition with her as well. That's an extraordinary amount of three-dimensionality in such little time for that character. But because the film is entirely subjective from Nina's viewpoint, anyone else can only be examined subjectively by their actions towards her. This is deliberate to keep everyone else's motivations subject for the purposes of suspense and Nina's own confusion--it's what helps drive her inner turmoil. Nina is very much in a bubble of inexperience and naivety caused by her mother's overbearance, an overbearance designed to protect her as well as hold her back. It not only makes her capable of perfection, but it also makes her incapable of surviving it.
 
I don't know. The pushing-pushing-pushing-living-vicariously-through-their-child stage parent is such a familiar figure that all we need are a couple of hints and the character fleshes in almost by itself. I think this is more a tribute to the performance, than anything else.
 
David Jimerson said:
I'm putting it out there . . .

Darren Aronofsky is the Rob Liefeld of filmmakers.
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lol

I'm confused by this statement. I wouldn't compare anything that Rob Liefield has done (in quality or context) that's similar to Requiem or Black Swan.

Are you saying people's *perception* of Aronofsky?

Also, while Rob Liefield gets the butt end of most jokes, remember that he was drawing comic books professionally at the age of 16, founded Image Comics and created some of Marvel's most endearing characters -- and created Xforce. For all intents and purposes we wouldn't have Deadpool and Domino or the first openly gay Xman in Shatterstar if not for Liefield. Also, he did a Levis commercial, so...

:)

I think Liefield is a pretty poor artist overall, but you can't argue with success, regardless of how it's obtained.

If you meant it as an outright diss, I would have thoroughly accepted Darren Aronofsky is the Lady Gaga of film. That I could jive with.
 
jkc123 said:
...maybe the Jim Lee of Filmmakers perhaps
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AH! See, now I'm further confused...lol

Dave meant his original comment as a diss, correct? And you're now saying with your Jim Lee comment, "Pa-shaw! More like Aronofsky's the most awesomest ever!"

Dave's original comment only makes sense if you hate or love Rob Liefield. And your comment only makes sense if you think Jim Lee is the shizzy or think he's a no-talent tool.

:::confusion:::
 
Brian_Rice said:
AH! See, now I'm further confused...lol

Dave meant his original comment as a diss, correct? And you're now saying with your Jim Lee comment, "Pa-shaw! More like Aronofsky's the most awesomest ever!"

Dave's original comment only makes sense if you hate or love Rob Liefield. And your comment only makes sense if you think Jim Lee is the shizzy or think he's a no-talent tool.

:::confusion:::
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Neither statement makes sense to me without further context. I thought it was cool to defend Rob Liefeld again in comics circles. Personally, I didn't like any of the early Image artists besides Jae Lee's work on WildC.A.T.s and Sam Kieth's work on The Maxx. I still bought all that crap, though.

Speaking of Liefeld, whatever happened to Ratner's proposed Youngblood film?
 
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vcassel said:
Neither statement makes sense to me without further context. I thought it was cool to defend Rob Liefeld again in comics circles. Personally, I didn't like any of the early Image artists besides Jae Lee's work on WildC.A.T.s and Sam Kieth's work on The Maxx. I still bought all that crap, though.

Speaking of Liefeld, whatever happened to Ratner's proposed Youngblood film?
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Dunno. But OH MAN as soon as you mentioned Jae Lee I had a Hellshock flashback (possibly the best wholly conceived comic series ever put to print) and then -- Wildcats! I totally had a Travis Charest flashback! I still think that his work on Wildcats/Xmen Prime (a total throwaway book) is the single best performance by any artist ever in any book period, including Alex Ross, Joe Mad, Scott Bachalo, Campbell, et al. Nothing he's done before or since can compare to it, but then nothing anyone else can compare to it either, so...


Travis Charest Art.jpg
 
No, I meant it to mean whatever it means according to your view of Rob Liefeld. Whether or not it's a "diss" is up to you.
 
He's a comic book writer and artist who generally appeals(ed?) to the same audience -- for the many of the same reasons -- as Aronofsky. As I said, whether or not that's a "diss" is up to you. If you find someone who's aware of both, chances are, they're fans of both or not fans of either. YMMV.
 
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