Movie Review: Black Swan

From my movie review vault:

Movie Tickets: $20 dollars

Popcorn and drinks: $16 dollars

Cost of my flu shot after sitting in an overly crowded theater filled with sick, sneezing, screaming children: $25 dollars

Watching the greatest performance of one of my favorite actresses career: Priceless!

I'm not necessarily a fan of standing in an impossibly long line, just to sit in a crowded theater, surrounded by coughs and sneezes just to see a film, but holy hot dogs was this one worth it. I know I've gushed several times over the past few months whenever I saw a film that I absolutely loved *Cough 127 hours Cough*, but this one really takes the cake. It was by far, hands down, a cinematic work of art. If ever I've had the opportunity to see a movie that changed the way I looked at film making, acting, and directing, this film would be it. It is most definitely a Loved It times three, with a capital L. Natalie Portman is breathtaking, transcending, captivating, and eerily haunting. While watching her performance, there were literally times where I forgot it was even her playing the lead role; she is so believable that she completely removes you from the theater all together and transports you right there, alongside her. It was just brilliant, and so worth the long line, and money! 

So enough of the warm and fuzzies, on to the review

Black Swan is a psychological thriller written by Mark Hayman, and Andres Heinz, directed by Darren Aronofsky, and stares Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis, and Vincent Cassel. The premise revolves around a respected New York City Ballet Company lead by Thomas Leroy (Vincent Cassel), who has decided to put together a newly updated production of Swan Lake. He cast Nina Sayers (Natalie Potman), a talented but rigid and meticulous young dancer as the Swan Queen, playing both the roles of the fragile and virtuous White Swan, along with the ferocious and much more sensual Black Swan. Nina is able to pull off the White Swan performance without a hitch, however, finding her way through the performance of the extremely sensual and seductive Black Swan, proves to push her out of her comfort zone, and test her limits both physically, and mentally. 

  

During the grueling process of trying to find a way to embody the infamous Black Swan Nina's mental stability begins to break down in ways befitting of the backdrop of a horror film. She begins to see her own doppelganger, whom she is convinced is her understudy Lily (Mila Kunis), who is torturing her in hopes of stealing her role as the Swan Queen. Her paranoia, sleep deprivation, and anxiety all come to a dramatic climax as Nina finds her self pushed to her limits, causing her to come face to face with her own dark side, and invoking the Black Swan in a way that is surprising to herself, and the audience.

I hate to sound like a broken record or a series of old re-runs, but as I said before, I absolutely LOVED IT! I've always thought Natalie Portman was an incredible actress, but this film shows to be the best performance of her career to date. Just as a side note, check out her arms! Talk about toned to the max, I immediately went home and did a few bicep exercises to tone the bat wings I call arms. I vouch for this film and encourage everyone to run to the theater and see it, I'm sure you'll love it as much as I did.

So...what have we learned from Today's blog?

Movie theaters are cesspools of bacteria, and outrageously expensive, seeing immaculately toned biceps can immediately make me feel bad about myself, and this years most talked about films have proven to be So worthy of the hype!