Robbery, pure and simple!

Rating: 10/10 (3 October 2006)

Let's get this one downer out of the way first. That Ellen Burstyn lost the Best Actress Award was a horrible travesty. That she lost it to an above average actress in a marginally average film about an incident of below average interest actually takes a little of the sting out because it demonstrates the political b-s- which is the Academy's voting process. Burstyn delivers the performance of her career as Sara Goldfarb, an older woman whose loneliness drives her to a dependence on diet pills. Had Burstyn won the award I'd probably be complaining about the inadequacy of the honor.
I don't believe in the concept of any artwork being 'definitive' of its style or subject matterÂ…but this one comes pretty close. I can't think of any other film about drug addiction which deserves to be in the same conversation with "Requiem". It's depressing, horrible, tragic, powerful, and intensely compelling.
I really want to avoid including anything which smacks of a 'spoiler' and might lessen the power of the rabbit punch a new viewer will inevitably receive but I can't help returning to Miss Burstyn's performance. My first reaction was to feel for the tragic young lovers Harry and Marion but their plight was really of their own making. Sara just wanted to be popular. She wanted to be on TV and be envied by her friends. She wanted to turn back the clock and fit into her best red dress. I know, I know, the doctor's prescription for amphetamines flies in the face of common sense and gives us a convenient heavy, but it in no way diminishes what Miss Burstyn did with the character.
There should be lots of other kudos attached to this film; Jennifer Connelly's delivered her best ever, as has Wayans, Leto, and Darren Aronofsky and Hubert Selby, Jr. put a lot of love into this screenplay. Selby's hands on to the point of living on the set and acting in a minor role.
Films are supposed to entertain us. For many of us the surest way to entertain is to evoke strong emotion. If this film can't make you feel, you've 'accidentally discorporated' (Heinlein) and haven't noticed yet. Ten stars!