Black Swan

Rating: 8/10 (25 January 2011)

From Oscar, BAFTA and Golden Globe nominated director Darren Aronofsky (Requiem for a Dream, The Wrestler), I saw the review of the film just an hour before seeing it on Film 2011 with Claudia Winkleman, it certainly looked the part. Basically ballet artistic director Thomas Leroy (Vincent Cassel) announces that the New York ballet company he helps run is going to do the production of Swan Lake for the new season, and with the retirement of original ballet star Beth Macintyre (Winona Ryder) means there will be auditions for a replacement lead. The role requires the female performer to play both the part of the innocent White Swan and the deceptive Black Swan, and beautiful twenty-something Nina Sayers (Oscar, BAFTA and Golden Globe winning Natalie Portman) is initially the first choice, certainly for the White Swan. Struggling to convince Leroy that she can play both parts, he has his eye on her competition, beautiful twenty-something new dancer Lily (Family Guy's Golden Globe nominated Mila Kunis) who nails the Black Swan perfectly. Initially Nina and Lily start off as good friends, hanging out together and of course rehearsing for the big production, with Nina as the White Swan and Lily as the Black Swan, Nina even has a fantasy about her in a dream. Slowly though Nina may be losing her mind, as she struggles to perfect get anywhere with Leroy, Lily steals her thunder, and her former ballerina mother Erica (BAFTA nominated Barbara Hershey) suffocatingly controls her. Her distinction between nightmarish fantasy and reality is rapidly disappearing as her skin develops strange bloody marks and scratches, her sky and innocent attitude turns into fiery anger, and she may be turning into the Black Swan she should for the production. Nina may have established herself as the new star for the show, but her darker side has really broadened, and it causes real problems when it eventually comes to the production to go on stage. Nina pulls off being the White Swan in the first act, but one flaw causes her to retreat to her dressing room, where Lily comes in, they fight, and she supposedly stabs her to death with a piece of broken mirror glass, and hides the body. Returning to the stage, this time as the Black Swan, her dark side finally breaks out to the point where she turns into the Black Swan she has "become", in her mind anyway, and she gets a standing ovation from the audience. Before the finale she is shocked to Nina come to her dressing room and congratulate her, she had another hallucination, and it was in fact herself she stabbed, being the White Swan of her, but covers it up and carry on. The last scene of the production sees Nina, as the White Swan, kill herself by throwing herself off a cliff, i.e. off a high stand onto a mat, ending with huge applause, and that is when everyone sees the blood, and she lies dying smiling that she was "perfect". Also starring Benjamin Millepied as David, Ksenia Solo as Veronica, Kristina Anapau as Galina and Mark Margolis as Mr. Fithian. Portman I have often found a mixed actress, with naff films like the Star Wars prequels, not bad films like V for Vendetta, and good films like Closer in her repertoire, I was hoping she would one day do something great, and hear she certainly does. Portman is mesmerising as the extremely troubled ballerina, and she deifnately deserved all the awards, Kunis is really good as her slightly toxic friend, and Hershey is terrific as the dominating mother, and Aronofsky brings back the disturbing he has before. The story is one of the most inventive in the world of ballet, an art form that normally doesn't interest me much, I could say the lesbian moment is great, but seriously, the film is filled with extraordinarily hypnotic moments, most actually quite terrifying and sinister, a must see psychological thriller. It was nominated the Oscars for Best Motion Picture of the Year, Best Cinematography and Best Editing, it was nominated the BAFTAs for Best Film, Best Special Visual Effects, Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Editing, Best Make Up/Hair, Best Production Design, Best Original Screenplay and Best Sound, and was nominated the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture - Drama. Very good!