Growth and maturity. The creative “process”. Digging deep within and finding untapped sources of inspiration. The many faces of the diva. The many moods of the (metaphysically) dying. For Darren Aronofsky, these are the thematic jumping-off points for his masterful new film, Black Swan.
At its heart, Black Swan is a story of a sheltered ballerina’s confrontation of self: the emotional traumas, the artistic and interpersonal growth involved. Outside such subtext, the brilliant director of equally fine films such as Requiem for a Dream, Pi, and The Fountain has found a way to revitalize the horror movie, putting the emphasis on the unsettling and the unreal over the gory and the gratuitous. The result redefines our perception of what is truly terrifying and what it means to push oneself to the limits — and then beyond.
Natalie Portman (in an Oscar-worthy turn) is the shy, unassuming Nina Sayers, a dancer driven by a need to be “perfect”. As part of Thomas Leroy’s (Vincent Cassel) NYC ballet company, she longs for a chance to showcase her untapped talents. The opportunity arises when reigning with Beth MacIntyre proves too unpredictable (and drunk) to star in the upcoming production of Swan Lake.
Auditioning, Nina wins the all-important lead. She also makes an uncomfortable new “friend” in her rival for the role, Lily (Mila Kunis). While the starring part makes her domineering mother (Barbara Hershey) ecstatic, Nina begins to feel paranoid about her performance. After all, Thomas is certain she can play the role of the White Swan, but he also feels she will have major difficulty playing the darker, more passionate Black Swan.
With Lily seemingly perfect (and plotting) for her part, Nina struggles to maintain her focus. Unfortunately, such a drive turns her fears inward, manifesting them in ways both unhappy and horrific.
The beauty of Black Swan doesn’t come solely from its subject or how Aronofsky puts it onscreen. Certainly, the grace of ballet and the skill set carried by its practitioners offers its own particular troubling beauty, and many of the social stigmas associated with such artisans – body issues, eating disorders – are hinted at here, but this is not a meandering movie-of-the-week, not an attempt to show how the struggle for balance brings one girl to the brink of madness.
No, what Black Swan accomplishes is staggering in its subtlety. It takes a typical scenario – a performer finally getting the chance they’ve always dreamed of – and then turns said career fantasy into a disturbing, deconstructive nightmare. One could easily envision the entire undertaking as a reflection of a single complicated character; a study, if you will. In Nina, we can see the silent sufferer (herself), the potential wild child side of who she could be (Lily), the doomed superstar of her possible future (Beth), and finally, the bitter, forgotten, and broken spirit (Mom) that dreams of days long gone by.
The great thing about this film is that this is just one intriguing interpretation. Like a finessed Freudian experiment, Black Swan is capable of many competing free associations. It’s Rorschach by way of genre beats. You can view it as a typical backstage melodrama, the dynamic between our heroine and her chief rival fated to end badly. You can also argue for an interpretation, akin to A Double Life, where the part played onstage bleeds over into the existence of the individual who has vanished within the role.
Indeed, Aronofsky hints at this latter concept by having Nina dream of the bifurcated dilemma of Swan Lake at the start of the film. From there, every scene seems to reference the Tchaikovsky ballet, from the appearance of temptation, circa Lily, to the fascinating dysfunction between Nina and her subversive stage mother. Once her inner Black Swan starts to take over, it’s like a stick of dynamite has been lit. Nina will eventually explode, and when she does, it’s bound to be drastic, if not deadly.
The parallels between the perfectionism felt by our lead and the way Black Swan exploits it make for an endlessly shocking experience. Aronofsky plants seeds without ever being wholly obvious. Nina has a problem with self-inflicted injuries, including using her sharpened nails to raise welts along her back. There are also several allusions to the true price ballerinas pay, from split toenails and sprained joints to more haunting, internalized pains.
As stick-thin visions of unrealistic splendor, the dancers dissolve into an antiquated notion of art – a weird unrealism that Aronofsky explores with vigor. Some have suggested a connection to the classic Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger film The Red Shoes, but there is more to Black Swan than that. While it does deal with art and the uncontrolled compulsion, it’s more fear-oriented than a fairytale.
As he proves over and over again, no one commands the camera better than this determined director. There are moments in Black Swan when Nina’s split personalities battle to emerge, to become something more familiar and normal, and in these sequences, Aronofsky uses the lens as a window into a world of unclear motives.
Kunis’ Lily may be naturally gifted, but her mannerisms have stage door tramp written all over them. Or does it? Is it only in Nina’s mind that we see the supposedly normal byplay between mentor man and subservient soon-to-be star? Everything about Black Swan could be part of the processing that our lead goes through before taking on a part. Actors call it “the Method”. Dancers may have something similar, though in Nina’s case, the technique is clearly torturous.
With his terrific cast (Portman has never been better; she is as lost in the performance as the frightening young woman she’s playing) and his multilayered meanings to every plot point. With this film, Aronofsky finds a way to top himself, and that’s saying something. Black Swan is beguiling and seductive, utilizing recognizability and the known realities of a life in the service of art, while moving way beyond the easier explanations.
Black Swan represents that rarest of Hollywood elements: vision. It crackles with an energy that only arrives when all the cinematic stars are in near-faultless alignment. For his part, Aronofsky adds his creative fuel to the already blazing year-end Best-of fires. In the end, Black Swan may be nothing more than a psycho-sexual thriller with “be careful what you wish for” overtones. How the film illustrates such collisions, however, marks it as one of 2010’s best films.