Every time I sit down to watch Requiem for a Dream, it frightens me a bit.
When you feel fear anticipating the viewing of a movie, it's usually because of unknown horrors that await, based on the reputation of the film or its MPAA rating. It's not usually with a film you've seen at least three times before, possibly four.
That's just how unsettling Darren Aronofsky's sophomore effort truly is.
Each time, I'm not sure if I can handle it. I'm not sure if I will feel safe.
And that's a thrilling situation to find yourself in, if you are a real cinephile.
Of course, I do know now that I can handle Requiem for a Dream. While some -- most -- viewers stopped at one viewing, I have revisited it at least twice -- and I remember the experiences vividly. There was the time I watched it in my apartment in Sherman Oaks in what would have been 2004 or 2005, before I started keeping track of repeat viewings. And there was the time I rewatched it while away at the hotel for one of my weekend projector festivals back in 2017. Was there one other between 2004 and 2004/2005? Likely not -- if I don't remember the experience, it probably never happened. Because you remember watching Requiem for a Dream.
Each of those experiences were also characterized by being alone. This isn't a movie I want to watch with my wife making her usual trips back and forth through the living room, trips she makes because she settles down for the evening later than I do. And though Wednesday night's viewing was conducted while she was at home, it was in the garage on the projector with the door closed, where at least she'd have to intentionally expose herself to it by coming to ask me a question. She never did.
You don't really want to have to explain why you have chosen to pass a particular evening by watching Requiem for a Dream. It feels like you have to be responding to some disturbance in yourself to watch it. Sure, I could explain that I am rewatching Aronofsky's films for this series on my blog. But I likely wouldn't get that chance, because she wouldn't ask and would just reach her own conclusions.
I tried watching it with someone once. It didn't work out very well. I'm sure I've told this story on this blog before, but it would have been ages ago. The first time I saw Requiem, it was on a second date, back when I lived in New York City. She was a cinephile so it wasn't a ridiculous suggestion on my part, but I had to know the movie would be confronting. I couldn't know that she'd have her face pressed into me in the final sequence, either crying or just kind of half-moaning, half-screaming in agony. And no, this was not just some kind of ploy to cuddle up to me -- she was destroyed. You'd think it would have been the last date, but we did have about two more -- though no more movies I don't think. (We saw Quills on our first date. I probably should have gone with a rom com the second time.)
Since this was indeed at least my fourth viewing, I'm not sure how many new takeaways I have. Though there were a couple things I'd forgotten. Such as:
- The appearances of Dylan Baker and Keith David. I of course remember the film's four stars and the returning Aronofsky collaborators from Pi (Sean Gullette and Mark Margolis), plus Christopher McDonald from the TV program Ellen Burstyn's character is obsessed with. But the other two faces I recognized, who appear in small roles, I had forgotten.
I doubt David would have been cast in this role today. He's sort of the personification of Marion's downfall, as he sleeps with her himself before bringing her into the debauchery that climaxes her character arc. Casting a Black man in this role today would just be too problematic.
- How much the song "Lux Aeterna" by Clint Mansell is used in the movie. And the thing I learned is that this was his own composition, even though it sounds like a repurposed bit of a classical symphony. (I also remembered that the Paul Oakenfold version of this song is called "Zoo York.")
- That Mansell did the score. Like Aronofsky, he's one of the ones credited on two of my #1s, having also scored Aronofsky's The Wrestler and Moon.
Without getting in to too many specifics, I was also reminded just how ground-breaking this felt when it was released, with Aronofsky's trademark drug-taking montages, those quickly edited sequences that end with a pupil dilating, as well as his use of split-screen. But those are just the editing techniques. He also places his camera in extremely confronting angles, as when he puts it just in front of the character, attached to their body but pointing back at them, to create a fish-eye perspective on whatever terrible thing is happening to them.
I think especially as some people have felt wary of his later efforts -- mother! and The Whale in particular -- the take on Aronofsky has become that he's in love with flashy technique that reveals his true try-hard nature, and that he pushes buttons just to push them. He certainly does these things in spades in Requiem for a Dream.
But he also thrills us like few other directors can -- enough to make this cinephile come back to the movie that haunted people's dreams, resolving them to never see it again, for at least the fourth time.
I'll skip the next two films in King Darren's filmography as I've seen both The Fountain and The Wrestler in the past two years. Conveniently, that will leave four more films in four more bi-monthly slots, starting with Black Swan in June.
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