Black Swan -- A Reaction

I went to see Black Swan the other day and left the theater unsure of how I felt about the film. I generally pretty opinionated, so this surprised me a little. Watching the film, I was annoyed by a lot of what I was seeing, but given the nature of Black Swan, those complaints may be a little superficial. I'm basically going to be working out my thoughts here (admittedly, I've already spent a good amount of time thinking about this and think I know the general idea of where I'll end up). And warning: there be spoilers ahead.



The basics
As I stated above, there were several aspects of the film that annoyed me while watching. First and foremost is that I hated Nina (Natalie Portman). She simply seems too weak for anything. I don't believe her character would last four years in that company let alone have enough drive to want to be the lead in anything. I can't really support this position beyond a gut reaction because that's the entire point of the character. And, as I'll discuss later, she has deep mental issues that could be a result of those four years with the company. Furthermore, Portman (who I don't really care for as an actress) legitimately comes across as a changed woman when she becomes the Black Swan. It's a pretty stunning change and I have to give credit to her for being able to sell the weak and the strong so well. Even though I hate the character, I can't justify it as an excuse to malign the film since that's exactly what the filmmakers were going for.

Nina's mother (played by Barbara Hershey) is one of the worst cinematic tropes I can think of: the overbearing parent. It's such an easy way to garner sympathy for the protagonist and make simple explanations for why the character, in this case, Nina, is struggling. All I can think about when I see an overbearing parent is their child developing telekinetic powers and running amok at the prom or whatever social gathering is imminent. I'll be returning to this complaint as well.

The subplot with Beth (Winona Ryder, who I didn't even know was in the film) seemed totally extraneous. I understand what they were going for, but since Black Swan takes place so much in Nina's head, it doesn't add a whole lot to her character or the film as a whole. However, Beth lets there be more Thomas (Vincent Cassel) and I really enjoyed his character. Even though he's a creep, I kind of liked his methods to try to get some fire in Nina's heart. I especially enjoyed when the audience thinks he's about to take advantage of Nina and stops short sneering, "that was me seducing you" and walks away.

In The Wrestler, director Darren Aronofsky followed Mickey Rourke's Randy around everywhere with the camera, all hand-held. I thought that was a genius bit of filmmaking. The image of a wrestler being followed into the ring is so identifiable that it makes sense to use the same image every time Randy went somewhere. He's entering a new battle everywhere he goes. Aronofsky uses the same motif throughout Black Swan and it simply doesn't work. Aside from the jerkiness of the camera (seriously, it's a film about ballet. You couldn't get your hands on a steadi-cam and create some graceful camera movement?), it doesn't make any sense. I can see an argument that by following Nina, it's focusing on the other side of the character (with doubles being so important to the film), but that doesn't really hold water for me. It was just distracting.

To take a step back from complaints, I thought the ballet scenes were amazing. The interplay between the camera and the actors was incredible. I can't imagine how difficult it must have been just to get the choreography of the dancers down let alone throwing a camera in there. Every dance scene was filled with palpable tension and made me question my reluctance to ballet (which really, I've never seen one, so why should I be reluctant). I was in awe of the movement and control of everything on screen.

It's all in her mind
My biggest problem in assessing Black Swan is almost everything is perceived through Nina's eyes, which pretty much means there is no reality. We know early on that she's not right in the head (exemplified in the awesomely icky "skin peeling" scene). Since we know this so early, you don't trust anything else in the film which, to my mind, hurts the narrative. By the time we've dealt with the many hallucinations, she's stabbed Lily (Mila Kunis) on the night of her big premiere. It's immensely more interesting to me to think that she has to perform knowing that she killed someone and this might be her last show than to have it be in her mind. Granted, the way the tied it up was fairly elegant, if a bit unbelievable.

Once we know something so extreme happened in Nina's mind, it calls into question the entire film, which helps in terms of Nina's psychosis, but hurts every other character. It's a mildly fun game to play: was her mother really that overbearing? did she and Lily actually go out dancing together? was Lily ever anything more than a random girl Nina fixated on? But in terms of the film, I'm not sure this re-evaluation adds much to a character we've already seen paranoid and hallucinating.

And I don't think we needed to excessively silly image of her sprouting feathers and turning into a swan, even if it was in her mind. We already know she embodied the role. There's no need to play Whack-a-Mole with your audience.

The use of doubles
Aranofsky does pretty much everything in is power to illustrate the idea of doubles. From the use of mirrors, the plot of Swan Lake (which, if you haven't guessed, is the ballet being performed in Swan Lake), Nina coming face to face with herself, to Black Swan paralleling Swan Lake, there is a wealth of double imagery. In normal circumstances, it would feel a bit heavy-handed as it's so prevalent, but the mirror shots are pretty organic in the world of dance since dance studios are surrounded by mirrors. With all of the mirrors around, the camerawork is that much more impressive (acknowledging that any time a reflection is seen, they could simply CG it out). I still say the double imagery falls on the side of excessive, but at least it's not overbearing.

In the end...
I guess I don't find horror of the mind all that engaging. I was never bored with Black Swan and there are some aspects I really enjoyed. Leaving the film, I thought that I'd end up on the side of liking it, but I'm not so sure anymore. I'm not so inclined to revisit it, though I am kind of inclined to check out Swan Lake, so that's something.

What'd you think of Black Swan? Am I way off in my analysis? Did I miss anything? Not take it far enough?