Black Swan reviewed

Nominated for five Oscars at this year’s Academy Awards, and winner of one (for Best Actress), Black Swan is one of the most highly acclaimed films released during 2010. A powerful examination of obsession with perfection, and the paranoia that stems from female competition, Black Swan is very good. However, I’m unable to go so far as to call it outstanding. The film is what it is – an uncomfortable psychological thriller – but it didn’t burrow under my skin nearly to the degree that I expected. And I was at no point surprised. Then again, perhaps I’m just a jaded, over-viewed movie blogger. Alternatively, I may have spoiled Black Swan a little for myself, having watched the trailer, read about the film and looked forward to it for months.


Director Darren Aronofsky has described Black Swan as the sister film to his award-winning pro-wrestling drama The Wrestler, and comparisons are easy to make between the two films. One of the most obvious contrasts is that while The Wrestler features a supportive professional fraternity, where the feuds between wrestlers are manufactured for the ring, Black Swan’s world of career ballet is viciously competitive. Behind the scenes, dancers already anxious about their weight and advancing age are unable to trust their colleagues enough to form friendships. Everyone is a rival as they vie for the position of principal dancer.

This is the exact situation in which Natalie Portman’s Nina finds herself. With the forced retirement of star Beth MacIntyre (Winona Ryder), the lead role in the New York City Ballet Company’s upcoming production of Swan Lake is up for grabs. As a dedicated, technically perfect dancer, Nina is a cinch to play the White Swan. However, the role is a dual one and Vincent Cassel’s director seriously doubts whether frigid Nina can portray the White Swan’s dark, sensual twin, the Black Swan. Free spirited, intuitive Lily (Mila Kunis) may be the better choice for the role.

Cue a surge of paranoia, anxiety, and perhaps even psychosis as Nina increasingly succumbs to the stress of her situation.


Black Swan makes excellent use of hand-held camerawork, particularly during the dance scenes. This approach not only emphasises Nina’s emotional instability but helps to give the classical ballet scenes an engrossing, contemporary feel – shattering conceptions that ballet is too formal, dull and emotionally aloof for today’s audiences.

Of course, the best thing about Black Swan is its performances… across the board. Portman is superb as Nina, a fragile young woman who has spent so long attempting to please others that her repression of self is now manifesting in various nightmarish forms. Portman’s Nina is a pitifully desperate figure, but she doesn’t lose her likeability.

At the same time I think it’s safe to say that Mila Kunis has well and truly separated herself from the bitchy bimbo persona she established on TV sitcom That 70’s Show. As Lily the actress radiates a relaxed confidence, effortless sensuality and unquestionable appeal. While Portman has always had a reputation as a serious actress, in Black Swan Kunis demonstrates her own dramatic talents.

A special mention must also go to Barbara Hershey in the supporting cast as Nina’s mottled, overbearing mother. A failed ballerina who has evidently guilt-tripped her daughter her entire life into following in her footsteps, Hershey is a truly unnerving figure.


All this said, I wasn’t entirely satisfied by Black Swan. I wasn’t sent squirming by Nina’s hallucinations, which is what you expect of a psychological shocker. Even with a few twists, the film never veered into unexpected territory.

As a result I kept thinking of similar themed French film The Piano Teacher, in which Isabelle Huppert's middle-aged piano teacher (who also lives with her controlling mother) heads down a much blacker path as she explores her repressed sexuality. Genital mutilation, rape, repeated self harm – The Piano Teacher offered a much more disturbing, essentially torturous look at a woman whose sacrifices for perfection in the Arts have left her a tangle of neuroses beneath her icy exterior.

I do recommend Black Swan for adult moviegoers, male and female alike. The performances, cinematography and top-notch filmmaking as a whole make it must-see. However, as good as it is – as much as it reminded me of the over-achieving, high pressure mindset that gestates in an all-girl high school environment – the film just doesn’t take that final step to haunting brilliance. Black Swan is a 4-star, not 5-star film.

Comments

Anonymous said…
derp de doo 4 star not 5

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