Nina (Natalie Portman) is a committed dancer. She pushes forward with everything she has to be the absolute best. So when she lands the role of a lifetime in playing the Swan Queen, she is ecstatic. The only issue is her director (Vincent Cassel) knows she can play the White Swan perfectly, but her dancing is too pure, and not at all seductive enough to play the Black Swan. She needs to learn to play the Black Swan, while her new rival Lily (Mila Kunis) is the embodiment of the Black Swan - seductive and powerful without effort. The rivalry develops into a twisted friendship, and Nina's Black Swan begins to take form as Nina's relationship with her overbearing mother (Barbara Hershey) reaches a boiling point.
I'm going to spoil the movie very quickly for you: Darren Aronofsky made "Fight Club" with ballet instead of an underground fight club. Possibly more engaging, because there is actually beauty in this movie and not just Edward Norton being insecure. Natalie Portman nails it, and perfectly portrays the stress she is under, and how painful it can be on someone. As the movie progresses, the abuse Nina takes becomes more and more severe: her mother is controlling, her director verbally abuses her and leads her on sexually, and she receives many unwanted advances and cat-calls.
This is a movie about sexuality, discovering yourself, and mental illness. All rolled into one. And it works. It might take a viewing or two to understand what's going on completely. When you get it, it's so abundantly clear that Nina is a sick person, and she needs help. Her mother had been trying to help her, but her mother was also a sick person who was incapable of offering her the help she needs. In fact, Nina was surrounded by people sick in one way or another, and she has no one to assist her in getting the help she needs.
Much of the movie is left ambiguous, much in the way "As Above So Below" was. This really works in "Black Swan". What does Nina imagine? What is real? Who actually stabbed Winona Ryder in the face? Or did it happen at all? At the end of the movie is Nina dead? We're in the mind of a very sick person, after all. Do we deserve the answers to these questions? I don't think so. We ARE Nina in this movie. Nina never knows the answers, and neither do we.
The musical score perfectly compliments the movie, and the movie itself is damn good. It's unfortunate that this movie was basically forgotten after Natalie Portman won the Best Actress at the Oscars, Golden Globes, and basically every other award ceremony for 2010. It was also nominated for four other Oscars: Best Picture, Best Directing, Best Cinematography, and Best Film Editing. I don't normally agree with award ceremonies (In fact, I don't even watch them because I feel like they get so much wrong), but this movie deserved the recognition. I just wish the recognition carried on a bit further.
My one big critique of the movie is that Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis look remarkably similar at a quick glance. Many parts of this movie utilize a quick shot of Nina's face on Lily's body or Lily's face on Nina's body. Doing this with two people who look very similar at a distance means you take an extra second to realize what the shock is, and then you miss the shock factor of the scene. Watching it a couple times you pick up on when these (almost) jump scenes occur, and you can be ready to recognize one face over another.
I love this movie, and I love Aronofsky's "The Wrestler". He has claimed they are companion pieces, but I don't see it. They are very different from one another, but both enjoyable. Unfortunately we won't be covering "Fight Club" or "The Wrestler" in this blog, but they are both tremendous movies. If you haven't seen either, I highly recommend them both. And this. Watch this movie if you haven't - it's compelling, wonderfully written, perfectly executed, and purely enjoyable. Following Nina's transformation will keep you thoroughly engaged.
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