Requiem for a Dream

I’ve just watched it and I’m full of impressions. This film should be mandatory for anyone thinking about trying drugs. I can’t remember ever watching a more intense and more hopeless film. Even the beginning is no idyll and things only get worse with every minute, and by the end the situation is utterly bleak. Aronofsky seems to be a huge talent and I don’t think it’s too off the mark to say that he’s one of the most promising directors today. The way he plays with images, music and sounds is just perfect, the direction of the dream and hallucinogenic sequences is truly psychedelic. 100% (15/09/2008)

Straightforward - transparent - destructive. Although one swears that Aronofsky is working with his triad of destinies so ostentatiously that the viewer cannot be caught with his pants down, it happens nonetheless. Thanks to famous editing, fantastic music and a gourmet tempo, and the atmosphere of the shots, Requiem for a Dream escalates into unbearably creaking tones of frustration and humiliation. Mansell's central melody makes one feel cold, but the visual poem Darren composed for it tears the skin. Although the film typically does not have a particularly deep interior, its surface is so perfect and so well targeted that it cannot be resisted. (24/11/2008)

I don't think I've ever seen a comparably unpleasant film about addictions of all kinds, and truth be told, I don't want to see it again. I have to admit, however, that the ever-repeating merry-go-round of fast cuts, coupled with the intrusively infectious musical accompaniment, had such a frantic gradation as the end approached that it was hard to resist. That's actually one of the reasons I decided to like this film. My great admiration, however, goes to Ellen Burstyn, whose riveting performance outshined all the others. (75%) (15/08/2021)

It's brilliant filmmaking, but its excessive darkness is its biggest weakness. Aronofsky, as co-writer of the screenplay, in an attempt to play on the darkest possible string, committed several screenwriting blunders, and very big ones at that. However, if I had to pick one drug-themed movie out of all the ones I wanted to use to discourage my potential offspring from using drugs, it would pick this one. It's not nearly as sophisticated and complex as, say, Traffic, and it's leaky script-wise, but it's so disgusting in its depiction of the consequences of drug use that it would have served its purpose perfectly. (10/02/2004)

When I saw the British cult film Trainspotting in the mid-90s, I was literally overwhelmed by its overview and deep exploration of the world of junkies and their survival in this world. And above all, I had a sense of authenticity throughout the film, given that the author of the book, Irvine Welsh, had firsthand knowledge of the scene, being intimately familiar with the life of the junkie community and the drug culture, and having tried drugs more than once. When I watched Requiem for a Dream, my initial impression was complete annoyance at the fact that the screenwriter was openly making a fool out of me, because only someone who may occasionally snort a line of cocaine at a glamorous celebrity party, not someone who knows the phenomenon of the drug world and junkies from personal experience, could come up with such nonsense and detachment from the subject matter. I was not familiar with Darren Aronofsky's work and did not know what to expect from him. But from the first moment, I got the feeling that his directorial style was overly exaggerated, with an obvious attempt to shock and emotionally manipulate the viewer. His music video-like style with fast cuts, slow motion, and most notably, the speeding up of the camera and overall excessive stylization reminded me of the film Spun, but that film primarily aimed to entertain and did not pretend to convey any grand message. Aronofsky's characters are only loosely sketched and, above all, they do nonsensical things. Building the main storyline on the absolute lack of heroin in the middle of New York City, which is the most lucrative drug market in the world and daily supplies a huge number of drug trafficking networks, is simply ridiculous. If the story took place in a sleepy town somewhere in the Midwest, I could easily identify with it, where one broken gang can truly drive many addicts to despair. Then there are plenty of logical errors, like the arrest of the junkie duo - since they weren't carrying drugs, they probably got busted for parking violations. :-) The main character gets sepsis from an infected and swollen vein, which is another absurdity because a junkie like him knows perfectly well where to inject the drug, and it's usually not even the arm because it's too visible - I could go on and on. When I read the reviews from film fans, I felt like I was sitting on a bus while others claimed that I was in psychiatric care. Well, maybe they are right... Overall impression: 35%. For me, this is one of the most overrated films on FilmBooster. (26/03/2010)