Dir. Darren Aronofsky, USA , 2010, 108 mins
Cast: Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis, Vincent Cassel
Review by Carol Allen
The only thing you can predict about Aronovsky’s films is that the next one will be very different from the last. What they all have in common though is his use of powerful and disturbing visual imagery. Black Swan is in some ways reminiscent of Michael Powell’s 1948 film The Red Shoes in that they are both set in the world of ballet and in both the heroine dances a role which destroys her. And just as Powell’s final image of Moira Shearer borne by her scarlet ballet shoes down the corridor and over the balcony to her death lingers in the mind, so too will some of the disturbing yet beautiful scenes from Aronovsky’s film.
Intertwined in the film’s story is that of the ballet Swan Lake . Nina (Portman) is an up and coming ballerina in a New York ballet company. The role she craves is the demanding duel one of the virginal White Swan and her sensual, evil alter ego, the Black Swan – a theme which is perfectly set in the opening ballet sequence in which Nina dreams of herself as the princess being turned into the swan by the evil magician. This is not however the story of the girl who becomes a star but a dark, psychological drama about a woman going mad and it builds its story very gradually and convincingly. The detail of the physical toll of the dancer’s life is very effective – Nina’s cracking toes, her bleeding feet and the scenes of the company in rehearsal and doing the grueling daily class. Plus the ever present mirrors, which dominate a dancer’s life and are an important visual component of the film.
The first indication we have that something is badly wrong is when we realise that Nina is self harming. Not all her injuries come from her work. When the company’s lead dancer Beth (Wynona Ryder) is sacked for being too old in ballet terms to dance the leading role in the company’s new production of Swan Lake , Nina achieves her ambition and is cast by the company’s dominating choreographer Thomas (Cassell). But while her apparent virginal innocence makes her perfect for the White Swan, the Black Swan appears to be beyond her range. Her friend and rival Lily (Kunis) however, has all the right qualities for the role and as Nina struggles to release her own repressed “Black Swan” sensuality, her tenuous grasp on her own personality and reason weakens, her repressed inner self takes over and she comes to perceive Lily as a dangerous threat.
Portman is very good in the central role – fragile, emotionally immature yet totally and dangerously obsessive about her art. As she descends further and further into madness and her world becomes a graphic nightmare, like the character herself we are never quite sure what is hallucination and what is real – something Aronovsky also did so effectively in Requiem for a Dream . Kunis is an effective contrast as Nina’s earthy, sexy rival Lily. She is a very striking actress. Cassel ‘s role as the lecherous, dominating choreographer could be seen as a bit of a cliché in the mould of Robert Helpmann but he makes it work. On a prosaic note, as Thomas claims to be doing a radical reworking of Swan Lake , one wonders why he didn’t go against tradition and cast Nina as the White Swan and Lily as the Black Swan – except then it would have been a different and less powerful story. His production actually seems to be pretty traditional. Ryder, in the comparatively small role of the rejected Beth, makes an impact as another example of the cruel demands of the ballet world and there is a particularly strong performance from Barbara Hershey as Nina’s protective but dominating mother, herself a former ballerina. The character is written and played as interestingly complex.
The film gets a little overheated at times as we move towards the climax but it always grips and never loses our interest. And the ballet sequences themselves, much of which were danced by the actresses playing the roles, are beautifully staged in a very cinematic way.
