Magnificent movie!

Rating: 10/10 (20 June 2011)

As someone said, a path of beauty isn't soft and smooth - it's full of harshness and asperity. When a talented but not to the level of genius ballerina Nina landed the part of Swan Queen in Tchaikovsky's immortal masterpiece Swan Lake she was warned about her limitations. The part required her to create two opposite images: one of the pure innocent White Swan, and another of the sultry, seductive and treacherous Black Swan. She was perfect for the role of White Swan but was failing to express the nature of the evil twin. Nina's own nature is that of a perfectionist: perfection is her religion, self-control is her Bible. But now she comes to realize that her Bible is exactly the thing that barricades her from perfection. She must "burn" her Bible, i.e. self-control, if she wants to grasp the wild, unrestrained nature of the Black Swan. This conflict is throwing her mind into turbulence and then into full-blown insanity. Yes, she "burns" her Bible and triumphs in the brilliant performance. But to achieve the absolute perfection she must also die in the end as the role demands. So be it. This is the explanations of why she did what she did in the last moment.