Thanx but no thanx

Rating: Null/10 (11 August 2003)

Normally I wouldn't have watched this movie.I'll reveal the reason in the end of this review. I've been proven correct after being convinced into watching this pathetic excuse for an original screenplay from a friend whose views on films I valued. Up to now anyway. To all those who haven't seen 'Donnie Darko': a)this review addresses specific shortcomings of the film so there are major spoilers for you b)don't waste time or money on this 'film'
After the end of the film I was left with a sense of being conned ; someone had tried really hard to convince me there was a meaningful script,an original mix of popular ideas-even ideals and a proof of sorts that American independent filmmaking is alive and well. Those illusions are even more impressive than those apparently experienced by Donnie Darko, a demented yet brilliant teenager who seems to have a habit of sleepwalking and conversing with human-sized bunnies. There is a lot of talk about how this scenario is well-crafted and thought-out and how one must watch the film again and again for it to 'sink in' while taking the time to navigate the web site. Well the scenario did sink alright. I mean this was an experience similar only to those who had the dubious privilige of the maiden voyage of the Titanic. It really is a mess of time-travel,psychanalysis,karma,parallel universes,etc,etc. You name it ; it probably is in there.The problem is that there's no coherency at all. I'll only go into the specifics of two cases which do stand out cause of their crucial role in the 'script'.
The first one is the bunny itself. I've been made aware of two explanations for it's existence. One is that someone from the future has sent it as a projection to fix the past and save the world. Since however the present would not have come to pass if the bunny hadn't showed up(?) then there would have been no future. The other explanation is that someone from a parallel universe has projected it into ours to save us. So here you'd basically have someone from a very advanced alternate future actually caring for as to what happens to one of the infinite parallel universes at some point in the past. I guess stamp collecting doesn't quite cut it anymore as a hobby in the year 3003..

The second much simpler case is the one of the jet engine. We have a jet engine plunging from the sky in two instances and falling onto Donnie's room mercifully killing him on the second occasion. Now apparently the second time this happens, everything is made right again. The world is saved and Donnie can rest in piece ( or pieces to be more exact ).Where's the problem here? Well the jet engine apparently came from the wing of a plane (naturally) in which his mother and kid sister were in. Flying. Somewhere high above ground. In the air. You get the picture. Yet in both instances the crash clearly wakes up both mother and daughter. So what's the deal here? I will take out the first occasion since the world wasn't quite 'right' then. But what happened after the world was supposedly normal again? Did the mother and kid sister exist in two places at the same time? Darn! There goes the world again!
Anyway since the film is apparently open to interpretation here's my take on it. There are some very interesting points made. The bunny appears up to the 2/3rds of the movie right after Donnie has swallowed his pills. The high school mascot has had an axe stuck at it's head. Its' solid metal head. Donnie tries to masturbate while under hypnosis.He also goes to sleep,presumably to die and he knows it ,with a wide smile.
What do I make of this? Donnie is a schizoid personality. He has himself stopped taking his pills (as it's openly discussed in the beginning of the film). His psychiatrist has grossly underestimated the severity of his case instead of alerting the authorites and promptly locking him up. The rest of the film is part-true (as to him connecting with a similarly disturbed girl) and part-lies (visual and acoustic hallucinations appearing with some regularity) In the end he cuts off all links to his girlfriend explaining the event in his disturbed world by the intervention of 'deus ex machina' probably a neighbourhood boy who had courted his girlfriend thus 'killing' her as a person in his eyes. He completely shuts his eyes to the real world and 'goes to sleep' with his intelect collapsing in the Freudian expectation of Death. The only thing amiss here is the frame of some guys in white overalls tieing him down and driving away to the sunset.
Overall the film was a huge disappointment. It had something going for it in the beginning but as another reviewer said 'after watching this look in Darko's eyes in his ominous sleepwalking routine I wished for 6-7 jet engines to come down hard on his head'. The more it seems to stretch itself,the less it has to offer. Make no mistake about it ; it would have made for two fine half-hour episodes of the 'Twilight zone', each with a different storyline. But as a movie? Thanx but ,no thanx. Which leads me to the original reason why I avoided watching this 'film' so far : Produced by Drew Barrymore....