Black Swan

I never liked movies about dancing and I particularly hate ballet. Somehow those thin, lightweight, graceful, goodlooking, talented women makes me want to weep in envy. Unfortunately, this movie made Natalie Portman bag an Oscar so I was curious to watch it.

I never liked the story. I didn’t get why she kept on having sores and bleeding. And I cannot understand the twisted, somewhat moronic relationship she has with her mother.

There’s a lot of things I can’t figure out from this movie (as with her instructor’s sexual orientation).   I get the dancing though.  And Natalie fits her role as a ballerina.  Other than that, I find this movie weird.

For me, this is a twisted movie about an anorexic, beautiful but mediocre dancer who's obsessed with perfection.

And while I can appreciate its originality, the only saving grace I can see is Mila Kunis. She has this old, classical, mysterious beauty that is uncommon for Hollywood actresses. Plus she portrayed the role of a very likeable villain. This for me is one of her more memorable roles.

Controversy:
Body doubles should be slapped with gag orders. Sarah Lane, the ballet dancer who was hired as a body double continues to claim that majority if not all the dancing shots are hers.  That may be true, but so what? I mean she was paid to be a double. She knows that she’s not and will never be the star. Do you think that she would have made this much buzz if Natalie Portman did not win an Oscar and was slammed by the critics instead?

To end this controversy, the director of the movie had the editor count how many body shots of  Natalie's were shown in the final movie against Sarah's. The results are that there are 139 dance shots in the film and  111 are Natalie Portman untouched. 28 are her dance double Sarah Lane.

"If you do the math that's 80% Natalie Portman. What about duration? The shots that feature the double are wide shots and rarely play for longer than one second. There are two complicated longer dance sequences that we used face replacement. Even so, if we were judging by time over 90% would be Natalie Portman." according to Mr. Aronofsky, the director. 

In this one, I agree. Give the girl a break. She’s an actress not a dancer. And just the fact that she fooled you enough to believe that she did all those dance moves already makes her worthy of an acting award.