Post its release in India, this movie had been heavily recommended to me by the sibling and my earlier boss. I have the habit of deliberately delaying watching some movies, and Black Swan was a ready candidate. My reason was that the storyline felt creepy and I was not in the right frame of mind to appreciate it.
Last week, a sanitized version played on one of the TV channels (I have forgotten which channel). When I say sanitized, it means that the sex scenes were abruptly cut and the creepy scenes where Natalie Portman’s character Nina tortures herself had mostly been removed.
The movie had me hooked.
Natalie’s character is a ballerina who seeks perfection in her work , and is unable to let go of herself while she seeks perfection. She gets the prestigious role of playing both the white swan and the black swan in the ballet titled “Swan Lake”. As she trains for the role, the audience gets to see the manner in which she chooses to let go of herself, her complicated relationship with her mother, her responses to fellow ballerinas Lily (Mila Kunis) and Beth (Winona Ryder), and the hallucinations she suffers from.
Picture courtesy: http://www.foxsearchlight.com/blackswan/
I cringed when I saw the petite Nina (who looked like she wouldn’t hurt a fly) tear out her own skin – why would she subject herself to such pain? The horror of it all struck me when I saw that she doesn’t remember inflicting pain on herself, for she is in the midst of a hallucination when she does so.
Nina’s performance as the black swan in the play is a class act. The movie doesn’t glamorize the hallucinations – she dies as a result of them.
What struck me was that ballerinas have a professional shelf-life similar to that of sports players – both professions rely heavily on physical dexterity. They have to maintain their weight much like Formula One drivers. The pressure to achieve a lot in a comparatively short span is quite different from that experienced by professions driven by mental dexterity, to put it mildly.
The movie also reminded me of my post on neuroticism.
Last week, a sanitized version played on one of the TV channels (I have forgotten which channel). When I say sanitized, it means that the sex scenes were abruptly cut and the creepy scenes where Natalie Portman’s character Nina tortures herself had mostly been removed.
The movie had me hooked.
Natalie’s character is a ballerina who seeks perfection in her work , and is unable to let go of herself while she seeks perfection. She gets the prestigious role of playing both the white swan and the black swan in the ballet titled “Swan Lake”. As she trains for the role, the audience gets to see the manner in which she chooses to let go of herself, her complicated relationship with her mother, her responses to fellow ballerinas Lily (Mila Kunis) and Beth (Winona Ryder), and the hallucinations she suffers from.
I cringed when I saw the petite Nina (who looked like she wouldn’t hurt a fly) tear out her own skin – why would she subject herself to such pain? The horror of it all struck me when I saw that she doesn’t remember inflicting pain on herself, for she is in the midst of a hallucination when she does so.
Nina’s performance as the black swan in the play is a class act. The movie doesn’t glamorize the hallucinations – she dies as a result of them.
What struck me was that ballerinas have a professional shelf-life similar to that of sports players – both professions rely heavily on physical dexterity. They have to maintain their weight much like Formula One drivers. The pressure to achieve a lot in a comparatively short span is quite different from that experienced by professions driven by mental dexterity, to put it mildly.
The movie also reminded me of my post on neuroticism.
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