Complicated rather than complex, creepy rather than cryptic...

Rating: 7/10 (8 January 2020)

"Donnie Darko" is so full of layers and interpretations (and it's so weird too) that I don't know by which end to take it. In fact, i would be a lie to say that I wasn't taken by its cryptic mood and the performance of Jake Gyllenhaal but another to tell you that I'm in a hurry to watch it again.
First, it took me time not to turn my eyes away and accept the nightmare-inducing face of Harvey's ugly cousin Frank (did he have to be some damn creepy though? It was like having a recurrent close-up on "The Shining"'s bear-man).
Also there's something rather disconcerting in that journey within Donnie's psyche, set in 1988 during the lapse of time between thee mysterious falling of a plane engine right in his room and the pre-announced end of the world, what makes the bridge between these two instances is interesting and Gyllenhaal delivers a great performance but a little less would have been a little more and the "blame" goes to young writer/director Richard Kelly.
The irony is that I'm not dismissing the film because I didn't get it, but because I did... or at least I think, but this is not a matter of getting the film than embracing its cryptic mood and creepy Lynchian psychological undertones. Because Kelly's film is a psychological thriller, but it's labeled as science fiction as well and this makes sense since the film uses many time-travel archetypes although the least famous bits, but I wish it could make a choice between Darko's mental illness and his "mission", or at least find the right balance. And this comes from a time-travel buff.
Indeed, 13 years before Nolan's "Interstellar", Kelly explores the possibility of travelling through time by using portals between two tangent universes that don't interact but can let some remains or artefacts appear where (and when) they were not expected. If the right factors are combined, it is theoretically possible to go from a point A in a time t, to a point B in a time t minus something... and affect the time space continuum. Fair enough, so we have the travel, all we've got is to turn it into a mission and this is where Frank intervenes.
The horrific giant bunny convinces Donnie to basically prevent the end of existence. How would Frank be trustworthy? Well, if it wasn't for him awakening Donnie at night when the engine fell in his room, Donnie would be dead. So, Frank isn't your usual imaginary friend, he's a blessing in his life only to reveal that the rest of the world is cursed. But how would Donnie, a high school kid, know what to do to prevent the cataclysm? In fact, the other clues are provided by his entourage, a school teacher played by Drew Barrymore who mention cellar doors, another teacher who gives a book about the "philosophy of time travel", it's like everyone is either luring Frank into his final destination or maybe they're manipulated by the very instance that jeopardized the future of the world. Donnie is still the chosen one.
It's interesting to see Gyllenhaal playing a kid with all the makings of an outcast and yet who's so immersed in his little suburban cocoon that in the span of a month, understands everything. I confess I read a few things that helped me to get the film (including some trivia about black holes) but the last time I saw the film, eleven years ago, I understood the basics and therefore I could really enjoy it the second time for what it was, an interesting, although not flawless movie about upper-middle class life and a kid who's more a malcontent than some begging-for-attention weirdo or like that "American Beauty" voyeur. Gyllenhaal's acting (and Kelly's writing) combines the hidden anger with some subtle touches of sociability so that there's never a moment where Donnie crosses the line.
For instance, je makes valid points in his Smurfette rant and his relationships with his sister (played by sister in life Maggie) is more a display of vitriolic sibling's complicity than any real hostility. Donnie is actually at his most hostile when he tells his sports teacher (Beth Grant) what to do with her theories about fear and love and when he unveils the real face of her love-guru played by the late Patrick Swayze. If not substantial, these subplots show that Donnie is far from the cliché of middle-child syndrome in some dysfunctional family, the mother (Mary McDonnell) is attentive and patient, the father (Holmes Osborn) often cracks up to his son's shenanigans and both parents trust the therapist played by Katharine Ross. Donnie even gets the luxury of a girlfriend (Jena Malone) and their interaction were so sweet and genuine that I wondered what if the film had chosen another path? What if Frank was a hallucination with another purpose? What if the awaited twist was something else?
As soon as the mysterious wormholes appeared, all the true-to-life bits felts like decoys to cheap (though well executed) sensationalism. I feel guilty to criticize the film for the same reasons I enjoyed "Mulholland Dr." but Lynch had a whole different approach, he didn't make his film as accessible a Kelly who sins by showing and telling, and the film had a dreamy approach to its own theme, allowing us to penetrate the depths of their characters more than any needs or motives. Darko is as interesting as Naomi Watts in "Drive" but he's engulfed in a story that turns him into a pawn and a martyr rather than an existential character. Did he really have a choice given that the end of the world means his own?
The film is a celebrated cult-classic thanks to a terrific character and a terrific (terrifying too) story but I felt like both canceled each other, for a twist so ambitious it was underwhelming.