Nice try at a deep movie, but boring at its roots.

Rating: 4/10 (10 March 2003)

When I had heard great things about this movie from a few friends and some buzz on forums, I decided to dedicate a night in front of the TV with a good friend to watch this movie and expected a movie in the likes of Memento/Fight Club, to where you were kept on your heels until the end. What I ended up with, however, was a dull, drawn out movie that failed to spark my interest, and when the confusing plot twists started coming in, my disinterest kept me at bay.
First off, I don't want to have to go online and read a website or watch a commentary to figure out what a movie is about. After watching Donnie Darko, I was not only left disappointed, but confused yet not very much interested in thinking it all out in my mind. With this suspense/thriller genre, the number one thing you need is an interesting plot to back up your "good" plot twists to keep the audience in the movie and thinking every step through. Memento achieved this easily, and kept me interested until the end, Donnie Darko did not.
Secondly, the plot twist in this movie was so overwhelmingly confusing and introduced so late into the movie that immediately at the end of the film I felt a huge wave of disgust. "What just happened? Who cares I didn't have enough time to figure it out during the movie." Basically if you want to have a satisfying ending, introduce these factors a bit earlier so the viewer has some time to let it settle in. Memento and Fight Club had some sort of conclusion at the end, with a 5-10 minute ending that left you satisfied knowing what had gone on. Donnie Darko's 11th-hour plot twist, with its complex interpretations of time and space, did not really follow this format and did not leave me very satisfied.
With these two major faults, however, I would still like to commend Donnie Darko for its very in-depth view of the world and the laws of nature. Trying to let the viewer grasp at this type of information is very tough, however possible.
I would do this movie great injustice by comparing it to another movie that I had a similar, but much worse, experience watching. "Soul Survivors" was a movie in which the viewer is trying to piece together a puzzle of what was happening in the movie. The fatal flaw with this movie, however, was that the presentation was very subpar and also by the end of this movie the "shocking twist" didn't really register much in my mind. Anyways this movie's been getting very good reviews around here, so you be the judge. For me I give it a 5/10 just for the whole time and space integration and the complexity of it all, and it could have easily been a 9/10 if it had sparked any interest in my mind...