The Camera Work
The camera work is brilliant throughout this film. With a mix of carefully thought out shots, angles, and movements, the director was really able to grab the audience's attention time and time again. On many instances, the camera movement reflects how the character is feeling during the scene. For example, in the very opening scene, The camera is very steady as it follows the legs and feet of a ballerina at work. As she continues to gracefully dance, the camera steadily pans out, successfully capturing the elegant dancing. However, as the music of the scene shifts from light ballet music to a more menacing tune, the camera movement shifts from steady to hand-held. This gives the audience an uneasy feeling, as if something if off. As the suspenseful sound and camera movement build up, a dark figure suddenly emerges, walking towards the ballerina as she continues her routine. It then becomes clear that the ballerina is practicing for her audition as the swan in an upcoming show. The dark figure is the darker side of the well-known ballet. It was very simple to piece that together because of the contrasting camera movements that reflected the contrasting personalities of the lead role in the black swan ballet.
In another scene, camera angles are used to highlight the dominance of the ballets director. He is notorious for sleeping with the ballerinas he casts as the lead, so many of the girls feel they must impress or seduce him. Because of this, he has much power over them, since many of them are so desperate to be the lead. When he first enters the scene, the camera shows him higher up than all of the ballerinas, who are warming up. He looks down on them, watching their ballet skills. As the ballerinas begin to notice him, they are filmed from a high angle, looking up at him, to show they are inferior.
Key Scene
I chose to analyze the last scene of this film because of it's brilliance. This scene is what brings the whole movie together and beautifully concludes Black Swan. Minutes prior to this scene, Nina, the main character/ballerina, comes to terms with her madness. After arguing with a rival ballerina, Nina stabs her to death and hides her body in the bathroom of her changing room. Nina later comes back to the changing room only to be greeted by the supposedly dead ballerina. Upon finding an empty bathroom, Nina has the realization that she actually stabbed herself and that the argument never even happened. She quickly wipes away her tears and decides that the show must go on.
During this final scene, Nina is shown as the innocent, white swan running up stairs, being following by spotlight. This could be foreshadowing her death as the lights looked as if she was running up towards heaven. As the camera zooms in on Nina, it shows more and more of her wound. The once small blood stain is suddenly growing rapidly in size, showing the severity of the situation. Nina then leaps to the white swan's death, which was also the death of her innocence as seen in an earlier scene when she passionately kisses the menacing director of the play. After she lands on the safety mat, concluding the ballet, all of the other ballerinas and the director come over to congratulate her on her near perfect performance. The director leans over her, covering up her now large bloodstain. He is dressed in a black tuxedo in contrast to her white swan costume. This suggests that the director was the reason for Nina's emotional/mental breakdown. He put too much pressure on the innocent girl and made her unravel by the end of the movie. Nina knows that she is dying but she doesn't care. Her whole life became that ballet, and when it ended, so did her life. Her final dying words are "It was perfect," which are very powerful as she looks up towards the bright lights. In the beginning of the movie, Nina was shown as a very nervous and innocent girl. She even expressed her worries about her dancing ability when she nervously says "I want to be perfect," with her head looking down. By the end, she achieved her goal and really killed off the innocent, shy girl she used to be.
I thought that the whole premise of this movie was very similar to that of Birdman. Throughout both movies, the audience must interpret scenes for themselves, deciding whether the main character is losing his/her mind or if the event is actually happening (like when Birdman flies or when Nina grows feathers). By the end, most can conclude that both characters are crazy and the events are mere figments of imagination.
Mila Kunis (the thought-to-be-dead ballerina) really stepped outside of her comfort zone while making this movie. She was mostly known for comedies, including That 70s Show, Family Guy, and Forgetting Sarah Marshall before this film. Kunis did a great job in this drama, something I wasn't expecting from her.
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