Aronofsky's BLACK SWAN

[Tom Lowe]

Is anyone else as excited about this film as I am? Aronofsky is probably the most talented young director on the planet, and I have always been in love with Natalie Portman. Maybe she will finally fulfill the promise she showed way back in LEON. And let's not forget Clint Mansell!

Also... there are rumors that the first trailer for Malick's TREE OF LIFE will show before BLACK SWAN!

 

[Tom.Wong]

huge aronofsky fan right here. i was also reading some interesting things about what matthew libatique decided to do with the cinematography. he's a huge lover of grain, and felt he needed even more for this piece, and blew up a great deal of the shots an extra 30% just to get more grain in there. great DP, great director. this movie is gonna rock.

 

[C.H.Haskell]

Yes, also excited for this picture! Hoping for not only great performance but a great score.

 

[Mark Whatmore]

Sounds interesting and what a beautifully lit image,

 

[Omar Saad]

I can't wait for this film. Aronofsky is one of my favorites for sure. I still think that PI and Requiem are his best films (in that order). This one definitely looks like a throw back to those in terms of tone and the "holy shit, anything can happen" feeling that I got when first watching those two films. The reviews also look promising!

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/black_swan_2010/

 

[Rob Ruffo]

Likewise excited!

Beautiful still!

 

[Bruce Allen]

Good heavens yes. Have been looking forward to this for ages.

Hope it's good. Have been deliberately not reading about it / watching trailers / etc.

For a guy whose day job is working on movie trailers, I sure stay the heck away from them whenever there's a movie I'm really excited about

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

 

[Sanjin Jukic]

Haven't seen film yet but what is interesting to me is use of 7D

in this case perfectly matched to S16mm format that film was mainly shot.

Remember a time when I said that once about a year ago and was on attack from many S16 DPs (those wanted to be!!!)....

Here is an excerpt from American Cinematograpy article

Danse Macabre:
Matthew Libatique, ASC and
Darren Aronofsky renew their
collaboration with the darkballet
drama Black Swan.

By Stephen Pizzello

"We used a Canon 7D or 1D Mark IV for
all the subway scenes; I could just carry
a 7D and shoot on the subway all day
with a very small crew. I did some tests
with my wife beforehand to figure out
my ASA, my stop, and how I was going
to deal with the focus. I didn’t use any
rigs with it because I wasn’t trying to
shoot in the traditional way. I tested a
bunch of different exposures and then
brought the footage to Charlie
Hertzfeld at Technicolor, who put it in
the system so I could look at the highlights,
the moiré and the resolution.
Then I went back to the drawing board
to do more tests. The 7D has more
depth of field than the 5D, but I
needed that because I didn’t have a
follow-focus unit and needed to work
really fast. I shot everything documentary-
style. I did all the focus pulls by
hand, and we’d just look at it on the
camera’s monitor. I ended up shooting
on a Canon 24mm lens at 1,600 ASA
to get as much depth of field as possible
at a stop of T81⁄2."

American Cinematographer, 12 2010, pages 30-47>>>

Also Natalie Portman as a Black Swan has got the cover page from the latest 12/2010 issue of AC

 

[Tim Whitcomb]

Is anyone else as excited about this film as I am? Aronofsky is probably the most talented young director on the planet, and I have always been in love with Natalie Portman. Maybe she will finally fulfill the promise she showed way back in LEON. And let's not forget Clint Mansell!

Also... there are rumors that the first trailer for Malick's TREE OF LIFE will show before BLACK SWAN!

Im super stoked to see this film... but you still loved Portman after Star Wars prequels? She effin blew chunks in Episode 3. Couldnt believe it was the same talented and brave young lady from The Professional.

 

[Erik Franzén]

Super stoked!! This is going to be awesome! :drool:

 

[Sanjin Jukic]

To me Natalie Portman had her best at Tom Tykwer's - Director / Writer (segment "Faubourg Saint-Denis")

that was a part of Paris, Je T'Aime (2006) and Milos Forman's Goya's Ghosts (2006).

There you can see her as who she really is.

And also today of course she's got older that's normal and...

In many other movies she was more or less "forced" to play with her natural "virgin" look.

Example: Closer (2004/I), Mike Nichols - Director / Producer,>>>

I have feeling that also Aronofsky wanted to get something out of it even that he made her to play as a sort of lesbian.

But I'm sorry it doesn't fit to her at all, something there could be pretty wrong and also just manipulated for a specific purpose of that movie story.

Even though she's an actress, pretty and excellent performer.

It's something more about a chemistry that unfortunately Aronofsky couldn't see it before...

And also the moving images will tell you everything more precise about it.

However Natalie we love you...

 

[Rudi Herbert]

Tom,

Know you love Aronofsky and as I was leaving the screening I was invited to, I was actually thinking of you, wondering whether your love would blind you or you would feel as I felt, that this film is a disappointment. The emotions were telegraphed almost, making it obvious what every sentiment of the audience should be at every scene. Portman is great, and so is everybody else really, but the performances feel a little staged, some things like the lesbian encounters, feel totally gratuitous and the movie feels just tense and elaborate in general. But hey, don't let me deprive you of drawing your own conclusions. It might well be just me, I fell asleep at The Fountain after all, however majestic I felt it was, until my wife woke me up at the credits...I heard at the screening though that Arnofsky will be directing the next Wolverine movie, so that sounds promising.

 

[Andrew Rieger]

Tom,

Know you love Aronofsky and as I was leaving the screening I was invited to, I was actually thinking of you, wondering whether your love would blind you or you would feel as I felt, that this film is a disappointment. The emotions were telegraphed almost, making it obvious what every sentiment of the audience should be at every scene. Portman is great, and so is everybody else really, but the performances feel a little staged, some things like the lesbian encounters, feel totally gratuitous and the movie feels just tense and elaborate in general. But hey, don't let me deprive you of drawing your own conclusions. It might well be just me, I fell asleep at The Fountain after all, however majestic I felt it was, until my wife woke me up at the credits...I heard at the screening though that Arnofsky will be directing the next Wolverine movie, so that sounds promising.

I really like Aronofsky's work but sometimes I feel like he seeds his films with Gaspar Noe or Lars Von Trier-esque scenes for shock value like the bathroom sex scene in The Wrestler. Some like but I personally don't. Still there is no denying that he is immensely talented and very creative. I have high hopes for Black Swan but I have a feeling there are a few scenes that will be thrown in just to try to shock me.

 

[Tom Lowe]

There were not really an shock-value scenes in THE FOUNTAIN, were there?

 

[Andrew Rieger]

There were not really an shock-value scenes in THE FOUNTAIN, were there?

No, I guess not.

 

[Stuart Hooper]

I think I'm pretty willing to forgive gratitious lesbian encounters between Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis.

Can't wait to see the film, anyhow.

 

[Tim Hole]

I do have to respectfully disagree with you Andrew. I don't see anything manipulative or shock value about DA. In both PI and Requiem he was dealing with intense character based psychological drama. I don't think there was a single shot in other film that was place for shock value, that wasn't entirely orchestrated from the depth of the character(s) journey. It is not a thousand miles away from Haneke. Although Haneke really does like to beat the crap out of you a bit more than Aronofsky does.

I would carry on this point with Sanjin's post. 'Who she really is'...is an actress. When she played Jason Schwartzman's quirky ex-girlfriend in Darjeeling Ltd, apart from being completely naked in the opening scene she played a completely different role to any other she had before, the same with V for Vendetta. The audiences perception of Portman is not Portman. When you decide to play a role in an Aronofsky film you do it knowing certain things. The first is that he will take your character to a very dark place. From the trailer it is logical to assume that the lesbian scene, is no different to the masturbation scene. It is all about self perception and personal demons. The black swan, in Swan Lake is Odile, an imposter made to look like Odette, the white swan, so that the prince will profess his undying love for the wrong woman, so as not to break the curse. The black swan is merely a facet of her own psyche. Its not Aronofsky forcing in a lesbian scene into the story. There is depth and narrative reasoning.

This will, I hope, be another exceptional outing for Aronofsky. Look forward to it. Plus I am very interested in Mila Kunis. I think, given the right scripts she will show great depths in her acting ability.

 

[Richard G]

OMG. i just saw this film yesterday and it is everything i hoped for and more. first of all, this is one of darren's greatest films. if i were to compare it to an opera, it would definitely be his last movement, his final act, his grande finale. this is a director in his prime and what you see on the screen is nothing less than film aesthetic perfection.

on an image note. talk about shooting at high ASA's. the whole film has an extremely grainy look which i absolutely love. and some, not all of the images are somewhat less sharp than you would ever see coming out of a RED. could of been the projectionist, or could of simply been the traditional S16 "look", reminding me of grainy film classics like, "aliens," and "blade runner." mathew libatique in general, has a pretty symmetrical lighting style but i feel he breaks away a little bit from that in this story, and focuses more on the contrasts and relationships between dark and light (black and white).

this is natalies most incredible performance i've ever seen since, "the professional" and we have only darren to thank. he is one of the few directors out there that can squeeze every little emotion in the performance of his characters, and it shows. oscar worthy. and the rest of the ensemble is top notch, it almost seems like the characters he casts aren't actors but really embody there personal archetypes.

and last but not least, the trailer for "tree of life" which screened before the film was unlike anything i've ever seen. terrance malick definitely was using microscopic photography in his new film, and it looks AWESOME! i've only become a huge fan of terrance recently, partially because he is somewhat unknown, but have really come to admire his work. his new project looks really exciting and reminds me of darren's original version of, "the fountain" which was originally called, "tree of life" and starred brad pitt. wonder what that's all about.

anyways, anyone with a few extra hours to spare. go see this film! you won't be disappointed

 

[Tom Lowe]

I have mixed feelings about BLACK SWAN. There is no bigger Aronofsky fan on this forum than me, but I only give this 3 out of 4 stars.

I believe Darren might have suffered a blow to his ego with the foolishly negative response to THE FOUNTAIN. So, he decided to make a couple of small, personal 16mm films to get back on his feet. It worked, for sure. Portman is now among the most sought-after actors around, and will probably win the Oscar, which she should have won for LEON. He did the same for Rourke. Aronofsky is now the director real actors most want to work with most.

This piece was enjoyable to watch, but was too predictable and telegraphed. The scene I enjoyed most was the nightclub, just because it had some connection to the real, modern world.

Darren needs to move on. It's time for big ideas and brass balls again.

 

[Richard G]

wow, those definitely are some mixed feelings. i loved the fountain but not many other people did. i mean, the work by peter parks alone was so mind blowing, so much better than anything that could be created by computer graphic artists. but then in terms of the story, in-particular the third act, it turned into the Hindenburg disaster. i've never left a theater so unsatisfied, in terms of the end resolution. but by that time my standards for darren were so high from requiem, i expected nothing but the best. photographically, him and matt delivered. mythologically, fell short of an epic intergalactic independent.

as far as his last two films, yeah, he is definitely feeding us back our own shit. but i think the real question is, can darren make a film which is not about the protagonist coming to terms with his/her own darkness or madness? not yet, maybe the next one.