More effective than any anti-drug campaign

Rating: 10/10 (1 November 2000)

After seeing this film at the Denver International Film Festival, I began counting the hours until it opened at the local Landmark theater so I could see it again. Darren Aronofsky's masterful adaptation of Hubert Selby Jr's novel is by far the best movie I have seen this year.
Perhaps most impressive is the fact that I normally can't stand excessive use of rapid editing or being hit over the head with act structure, but, as with Pi, the editing actually added to the story, using repetitive imagery to show the patterns the characters fall into.
Also impressive was the way the entire feel of the movie changed with the seasons. When it begins in summer the film has a bright, optimistic feeling to it; by the time it gets to winter the movie feels cold and pessimistic. In addition to getting unprecedented dramatic acting from Jared Leto and Marlon Wayans, Aronofsky subtly changes the color scheme of the movie to reflect the situation of the characters.
Above all, this is a powerful film. There has been no shortage of movies about drug users hitting rock-bottom, but Aronofsky makes us care about these people; he makes us hope that they will actually achieve their dreams, so that, like the characters, we want to see the signs of their slow decent into addiction as only a minor setback.
I actually found this film to be more effective than Selby's novel, simply because Aronofsky's visuals and Clint Mansell's music increased the emotion behind the text tenfold. This film should be shown in high schools; it would be a far more effective deterrent to drug use than anything I've seen, in or out of the educational system.