From director Darren Aronofsky, Requiem for a Dream tells a chilling story about the dangers of drug abuse.
Ellen Burstyn gives a haunting performance as an elderly woman (Sara) lost in her fantasy of going on television and her addiction to diet pills. Jared Leto portrays her son, Harry, a pathetic drug addict who dreams of a comfortable life with his beautiful girlfriend based on making money by selling drugs. The ever so beautiful Jennifer Connerly is his girlfriend, Marion, a girl with a talent in clothes designing, who has a good family background, but who, as we shall see, loses everything because of her addiction to drugs.
Right from the start of the film we can see how pathetic these people are. Harry pawns his mother’s television in order to get some money to buy drugs. Sara is a lonely old woman, she is sad that her son is a junkie, she misses her husband, and she has nothing better to do but watch television all day. One day she receives a phone call which tells her that she is going to be on TV. She’s delighted; she dreams of going on TV in her red dress and talking about her husband and her son. Unfortunately she has put on a bit of weight and she can’t fit in the red dress; so she goes on a diet, which eventually leads to her taking diet pills. She becomes addicted to them and finally acquires anorexia, eating no food and only taking pills.
Harry is a loser. But he has a great girlfriend, and they love each other. He gets the idea of making some money by selling drugs, so he can start her a shop selling clothes designed by her. everything works fine for a while; then a gang war is started, and there isn’t any drug traffic on the streets. He and she, both addicts, are in dire need of a "fix", so Harry decides to go off to Florida where he can get a shipment. Marion, in her desperation for drugs, contacts a drug dealer who is only interested in women.
Harry’s arm develops an serious infection from his constant drug injection. On the road to Florida he is taken to hospital by his friend, and they end up getting arrested. Harry’s arm’s condition worsens; eventually it’s cut off.
At the same time Marion sacrifices her body in order to get drugs. Sara’s fantasy of getting on TV gets worse, and she is taken to hospital to be treated for anorexia. She refuses to eat anything; finally the doctors put her through a dangerous procedure which turns her crazy.
This film has an eerie way of grasping my feelings. At first I despised the characters, because you could see in an instant how pathetic and useless they were; but as the film continued you couldn’t help feeling sad for them, and hoping that their life can improve. Along the way you’re given false hope that indeed things are getting better; but then things take a sharp turn and you see through the illusion. And then you realize this film is true to its title: there never was any chance– it was all a dream, and this is only a requiem for the already dead.
A lot of films talk about drugs. It’s a very popular subject, yet I haven’t seen many of them. I enjoyed Drugstore Cowboy, which is another film about the realistic and doomed life for drug addicts. But that film didn’t give me the kind of shock that Requeim for a Dream does. This film is totally unmerciful, even cruel, perhaps, to its characters– Harry and Marion are beautiful people who deserve a good life together, and Sara is just a sad old woman; but once drugs got into their lives there was no turning back. The film does not preach to its audience with big words or scream out loud warnings; it simply shows us what would happen if we were to take drugs. We would be throwing our lives away.
Recent Comments