Required viewing for all film devotees *MAJOR SPOILERS*

Rating: 10/10 (11 August 2001)

*MAJOR SPOILERS*
Requiem for a Dream is not just another movie. Requiem for a Dream is right at or near the top of several lists: most intense, most disturbing, most depressing, most powerful... and, oh yeah, best of all time.

I'm not saying that this movie is the number one, best movie ever made. It has some flaws, mostly minor stuff, but they exist. Maybe I'll bring them up later, if I'm not too tired after praising the unequivocal genius of Darren Aronofsky and, equally, Herbert Selby, Jr., who co-wrote the screenplay and authored the novel that begged the movie.
First of all, I have to comment on the split-screen technique. It is genius. I didn't think too much of it in the first scene, thought it was a little gimmicky but cool; but when Aronofsky split screened Marion and Harry on the bed, with one side on one of the characters' faces and the other on the small of the other's back, or the other's Adam's Apple, it made me shiver. The intensity of that scene, the power, the love I felt, I have never experienced in watching another movie. I have never felt the warmth of that scene outside of real life.
Must comment on the actors' performances as well - Ellen Burstyn, while somewhat annoying at times, turned in the performance of the year precisely because she was so annoying. I just started to crawl down in her hole with her when she started popping more than one pill at once - and it shocked me. Jared Leto, who I've never thought much of before, was also mesmerizing. The scene in the kitchen with he and Burstyn (when he wants to tell her about the TV and finds out she is doped up)is, IMO, the finest scene of the movie. The tension, the feeling that these characters - with help from Aronofsky - create is absolutely gutwrenching. I love it. Jennifer Connelly is superb as Marion, so believable even as she descends into the arms and den of Little John. And Marlon Wayans as Tyrone also does an excellent job, especially once he and Leto decide to take off to Miami - the scene in the car, "600 miles from home" is also one of the movie's best.
The attitude of this movie, the pacing, everything directorial, is perfect (thanks, Darren)... the script is mature and leaves just enough to the imagination. I love the way Aronofsky films the drug/coffee sequences... it got me thinking, hey, this isn't going to be that graphic. But all it does is hit you ten times harder when Leto shoots up in the car on the way down and you see his arm... and then you don't...
The only negatives... I thought Ellen Burstyn's story was far inferior to the story of Leto, Connelly and Wayans. If Burstyn did not turn in such an amazing performance I would have hit the fast forward button about ten times. And without her performance, there really was no "other" story besides the kids'. Here I think the script fails, spends too much time watching Burstyn descend, showing the same scenes over and over, when we just need PROGRESSION from her story. You'll notice Aronofsky only pulls out the "gimmicks" - flying food, a walking refrig, and the TV show in her living room - for her story. No such fluff for the other story. In fact, I hated the living room TV hallucination in the same way I hated the hallucinations in THE BIG LEBOWSKI... it detracts from an otherwise mesmerizing script.
Also at the end, the kids both end up in jail... i didn't get that... and Burstyn gets the shock treatment, which is graphic for the sake of being graphic. It doesn't add to the story. All the other graphic parts of the movie are totally necessary, totally realistic, except for that.
Loved it overall, can't recommend it enough if you can stomach it...
9.4/10