The performances, along with Aronofsky's artistic merits, inspire a cleverly told thriller that is equally smart and sensual

Rating: 8/10 (31 January 2011)

A ballet company is preparing to perform a new version of the opera Swan Lake. It is to be headed by a younger cast as one of the more experienced dancers, Beth (Winona Ryder), has been forced to retire. Auditioning for the role as both the black and the white swan is timid dancer Nina Sayers (Natalie Portman). Her notorious instructor Thomas (Vincent Cassel) doesn't feel she is right for both parts of the swan though. He believes she is fine as the white swan but stresses that she must lose herself in the darker alter ego. Adding to Nina's pressure is the arrival of her understudy Lily (Mila Kunis), who she fears is trying to take both her role and the affection of Thomas too. She is also distraught by the controlling nature of overbearing mother, Erica (Barbara Hershey), who used to be a dancer herself. As her mind slips into paranoia, Nina's behaviour and sexuality becomes increasingly erratic and she starts to believe that the black swan, whoever it is, could be real.
Working largely as an independent auteur, Darren Aronofsky has been able to show his interest in the physical deterioration of both the mind and body. With his most restrained effort The Wrestler, he visualised this breakdown with a gritty and realistic surface. Black Swan, a horror appropriation of the opera Swan Lake, finds an appropriate middle ground between gritty realism and more absurdist cinema. After a dazzling opening dream sequence there's a rather cold feeling to the film though. Its damp, grey colour palette, claustrophobic corridors and coy protagonist are initially distancing forces. But as Aronofsky's metanarrative become more visible, the film draws us deeper into a mesmerising and suspenseful labyrinth. The feeling of dread is almost unwatchable and the film climaxes with an ironic ending of Shakespearean proportions.
For the ending to achieve this dramatic power, Aronofsky has the difficult task of drawing the audience into the headspace of Nina. He accomplishes this most skilfully through the film's subtle art design. Much of the film is beautifully painted with black and white shades to visualise the consuming power of Nina's work. The hauntingly muted visuals are contrasted with the brighter tones of Nina's bedroom, like her pink walls and stuffed animals, suggesting a gradually fading innocence. Selective tracking shots of the back of Nina's also suggest the film's deliberate subjectivity. Aronofsky limits scenes strictly to Nina's perspective so that the audience shares her paranoia. The morning after a wild night provides a deeply affecting scene that disorientates our sense of time and manipulates our presumptions. Tension is further built through the specificity of images, like the trimming of Nina's nails or the reoccurring rash on her back. Only Aronofsky's scarce reliance on more jumpy horror scares feel more conventional than the rest of the picture.
To further develop the notions of paranoia and control, Aronofsky draws career best performances from his ensemble cast. Portman is the dominant centrepiece here, working to subvert her usually sweet image as the physically and emotionally damaged Nina. She spent an entire year training and controlling her weight to transform herself into a highly credible ballerina. She allows Nina to move exhaustingly between a child-like innocence and into deep feelings of internal and external repression. It's an emotionally intense and challenging performance, set to be a defining step in her career. Contrasting the hysteria is the edgy but calm Kunis who amidst the chaos manages to be effortlessly cool. Her normality really adds to the film's irony and I suspect that on a second viewing the subtly of her performance would be even more apparent. This is a huge improvement from her work in Max Payne a few years ago. Hershey is wonderfully creepy as the fallen star too, another powerful force that looks to control Nina's life. These performances, along with Aronofsky's artistic merits, inspire a cleverly told thriller that is equally smart and sensual.