Pliet Filet!: The Black Swan Review

I, being a heterosexual man, never really took an interest in ballet. Strangely enough, I also never got in to the whole, "Durrr, lesbians are hot," thing, either. So, when I heard about Black Swan being about ballet, I was disinterested. When I saw a bunch of oversexed dimwits making a big hooplah over the scene where Mila Kunis and Natalie Portman make out, I was actually pushed further away. After seeing Luke Mochrie's review of it, and talking with my girlfriend about what movie to see this week, we decided to go see Black Swan.

First off, let me put this out there: Yes, there is a lesbian sex scene in this movie with Mila Kunis and Natalie Portman. If that's your prime reason for seeing this movie, prepare to be disappointed. It's not sexy. What's weird is that I mean this in a good way. If it was meant to be sexy, the movie would not have been as effective of a Thriller as it is.

The overarching story is about Nina, played by Natalie Portman, a ballerina who wants to play the lead part in Swan Lake. Her director, played Vincent Cassel, sees that she can play the White Swan, but wants her as the Black Swan as well. After some "convincing" (and it's not what you think), he casts her as both roles. Adding to Nina's pressure is her overbearing mother, the sexual advances and advice of director, and her rival, Lily, played by Mila Kunis, who at times is a sneaky threat, and at other times seen by Nina as her dark version.

Every thing in this movie is done purposefully, and very well. As a thriller, it's important for the audience to relate to the main character. I would normally find it hard to relate to a character who was a ballerina, but to me, that felt like a side note to what the story actually is. Nina is a perfectionist who is growing more and more paranoid that her rival wants her role, as well as not being good enough for it. Added to the pressure of wanting to keep her role in the ballet, Nina starts driving herself crazy, becoming obsessed with it. The deeper into the obsession she goes, the more chaotic things become for her.

What most directors would do is shove this in the viewers' faces. Darren Aronofsky doesn't, showing us Nina's gradual collapse of sanity at first very subtly, and ending with a visceral scene. Every scene is designed to seem surreal. Every character is made to be just over the line of sanity, at first to show the pressure on Nina by the outside world, and then to show how much Nina changed from innocent to her own dark reflection. Every line of dialogue is written to keep the viewer on edge. All of this mixed together means that the movie never has a dull moment. In today's films, where the middle of the movie usually seems flat (I'm looking at you, Faster), this is a refreshing change of pace. That is the only thing refreshing in this movie, because it's dark tone is constantly looming. No matter how subtle a it is, something off kilter is always happening, whether it's Nina's painted portraits changing expression in the beginning of the movie, or passing by herself in the ballet, her "duplicates" laughing at her.

Part of what makes her so paranoid is the fact that the Black Swan is portrayed as the White Swan's evil twin, which, in the beginning, Nina cannot understand how to play. She's shy, seemingly innocent, but quite possibly has some issues. Her scratching points to Borderline Personality Disorder, her hallucinations point to psychotic disorders (not schizophrenia, as I initially heard before, because they're visual hallucinations, not audio), the pressure she puts on herself points to depression, her alternate personality (if it even is that) points to dissociative fugue. I short, if she wasn't even a little bit crazy before (which is hinted at), the events in this movie don't help.

I have to point out that the choreography for this movie is amazing. It opens with a bit of ballet between Nina and the Evil Black Swan. While she seems to be graceful, the choreography is done to make it look like she's not in control. This only adds to the disturbing feeling of what's to come later on. Also, the way the choreography and the special effects meld in one of the last scenes of the movie is purely amazing, beautiful, and disturbing all at once. I do have to point out one bad thing, though. The camera work in the beginning of the movie is extremely shaky. This hinders a few subtly creepy images in the beginning of the movie that foreshadow events later on. But, it's not enough to break the movie, either.

Black Swan is truly a rare bird (pun intended) in today's world: a thriller movie that is genuinely frightening for the right reasons. It's intense, the writing is disturbing, and even though you go into it with doubts, the movie surprises you in the end with just how good the entire product is. To top it off, almost anyone can relate to the pressures Nina feels, not that everyone is a ballerina, but a lot of people have been put in the situation where they got something they really wanted, but at the price of fear of losing it to a rival. Black Swan is an unnerving work of art, well worth the price of admission.

I give it 6 out 6 music boxes.

... Also, I do have to point out that the line, "You had a weird lesbo wet dream about me!" is on of the most awesome lines ever written in a movie.