Faith in chaos
Maybe it was that end of days feeling in the air, but 1999 was a great year for young American filmmakers. Wes Anderson made Rushmore, P.T. Anderson did Magnolia, David O. Russell did Three Kings—still the best movie about the American invasion of Iraq, filmed before the actual event, David Fincher made Fight Club, and Darren Aronofsky did Requiem For A Dream. It was also the year of the massive betrayal that was the Star Wars prequel (I won’t even spit out its title), but we won’t get into that.
The previous year I’d seen Aronofsky’s first feature Pi in a Glorietta theatre. There were exactly five people in the theatre: me, my friend, and three yuppie scum who clearly had no idea what was going on. They kept squirming in their seats and saying, “What’s that?” in their fake American accents. Finally they got up and left but they couldn’t just get up and leave, they had to justify their idiocy. “It’s a stupid movie,” they announced as they scuttled to the exit. I said, “Because you’re morons.” Being morons, they didn’t get that I was referring to them. (I find that you can get away with calling people a lot of things.) My friend and I enjoyed—and I use the term broadly, because you don’t really enjoy being put through a wringer—the rest of the movie in the peace and cold. And since there was no one else in the theatre but a sleepy usher, we could scream NNNOOOOO at the part that requires it. (Smartypants, I’ll save you the trouble of mentioning this factoid: Aronofsky’s cinematographer Matthew Libatique is Fil-American.)
I saw Requiem For A Dream in a Toronto press screening, biting into the paper coffee cup to keep from screaming NNNOOOOO. Requiem For A Dream is the definition of “harrowing”. (It actually elicits good performances from Jared Leto and the Wayans brother who was in White Chicks.) At the end of the movie everyone staggered out wordlessly, bumping into chairs and doors. Then they stood in the sidewalk in the freezing fall air, smoking three cigarettes in each hand, nodding at each other. We had been through something together, and we were collecting ourselves before we sat down to describe that something.
Darren Aronofsky’s new movie is The Fountain, a science-fiction epic that does not utilize CGI. How is that possible in this day and age? The Fountain is already being vilified for excessive ambition. If you’re going to be vilified for anything, let it be excessive ambition.
Answers to questions you might be asking, unless you wandered onto this site purely by accident >>>
November 1st, 2006 at 16:57
“It’s a stupid movie,†they announced as they scuttled to the exit. I said, “Because you’re morons.†Being morons, they didn’t get that I was referring to them.
Hahaha!!! They are the stupid Mokelus of our time. Mokelu by the way is a Picchu famous for his “stupidity”. No matter how hard people tried to teach him anything, he still did not get it. He could not even recite one single Zen proverb. Therefore, all the 500 Picchu looked down on him. Nobody liked to be with him. So he was a lonely person.
One day, the king sent envoys to invite all the monks to his palace. Mokelu was ashamed of his stupidity. He was afraid of joining the gathering. After everyone left, he was very sad. He found a rope, stood under a big tree and wanted to end his life. At that moment, the solemn Buddha appeared in front of him and scolded him seriously, “Mokelu, instead of cultivating yourself diligently and finding out your shortcomings, you are doing such a stupid thing.” Buddha stopped for a few seconds and continued, “You were a cultivator with broad and profound knowledge in your past life.”
There you go. In pseudo profound science movie of Aronofsky’s The Pi – Did it ever occur to you that these Mokelus may also be ‘ourselves’ that exist in the alternative universe? People who we thought are morons because they are so thick that they gamble, extremely superstitious and have no sense of logic at all: the type of people who would use a random number generator to problem solve a complex situation. Like the numbers in the Fibonacci puzzle. Reason versus unreason. The String Theory versus The Big Bang. The Morons, your Smartypanty Friends and the Theatre – A place where all the normal rules of common sense have been abandoned. The eleventh dimension in The M Theory: A theory that will hopefully unite Stephen Hawking’s Strings and the Bigbang. The Pi. Ad infinitum.
Brilliant movie.
November 1st, 2006 at 21:27
aronofsky’s one of the best young directors in america right now. i saw a dvd of pi in canada three years ago, but due to lack of money, i wasn’t able to buy it. luckily, my contact from edmonton remembered how i drooled over the dvd, and decided to send it as a christmas gift for me!
can’t wait for the fountain. and i can’t believe he did not use CGI in the movie,yet the trailer still looked awesome!
November 2nd, 2006 at 05:23
Aranosfsky and Richard Kelly are two directors that seem to make people think after seeing their films. Their presentations aren’t for passive minds willing to accept entertainment alone. There’s the other level of entertainment where my thought processes are also bombarded with things to analyze. Pi and Donnie Darko both did this number on me days and days after I first caught the films in their theatrical runs.
Aside from The Fountain, another one to be expected as well is Kelly’s Southland Tales, which is a sci-fi story set in different chapters (one is even entitled “Wave Of Mutilation”–Pixies fans take note).
Another highly suggested film to check out if you’re into dissecting details is Primer. I found it frustrating to view this movie when I had my first crack at it. I ended up seeing it on DVD later on and it made much better sense. I wasn’t overwhelmed as I tried to keep up with the narrative and checked for subtle plot devices at the same time.
Southland Tales:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southland_Tales
Primer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primer_%28movie%29
November 2nd, 2006 at 15:15
I love love how you describe the Requiem For A Dream movie experience.
November 2nd, 2006 at 17:34
Mas hinihintay ko ang susunod na movie ni Aronofsky entitled Flicker.
Meron na akong libro niyan, nabili ko sa discount bin ng Goodwill for 30 pesos lang. It’s about old B-movies kaya interesado ako.
Nabasa ko lang 3/4 ng libro. i need to reread it again.
November 3rd, 2006 at 00:36
one of the best things about requiem for a dream is ellen burstyn’s performance, ewan sa mga academy voters na yan, pinili si julia roberts for the oscar. her performance and the score by the kronos quartet & clint mansell. what i wouldn’t give for a dvd copy of one of the best movies i’ve ever seen.
November 10th, 2006 at 11:26
i wonder what would’ve happened if the aronofsky batman project had pushed through. :)
man, until this day, i listen to the musical score of requiem. great gerat great!!