This is a VERY rough draft.
Black Swan is a film by Darren Aronofsky. Released in late 2010, it is a beautiful and dark movie about a young ballerina and her struggle with a demanding career, haunting mental illness and ghastly relationships. The target audience appears to be women of every age, though the content of the film would probably be enjoyed by a younger audience.
Beliefs : This film puts a lot of emphasis on Nina ( main character) needing to "loosen up", this reflects the writer/director's similar belief in not letting one's career take over their lives, that scenario being illustrated to an extreme in this movie
Values: This film reflects the societal value on beauty and fame, most easily identified by Natalie Portman and Winona Ryder's character's relationship in this movie. Winona's character was the star ballerina at Nina's dance studio before her, and along with Nina's vivid and violent hallucinations about Winona's character, the characters also fight in person, Winona attacking Natalie's beauty and status, explaining how it is fleeting, and that she too will be 'washed up' like her one day.
Attitudes: This girl Nina is technically very successful. She is a prima ballerina at a well established dance school in new york. This film, is mostly about how that "success" has (literally and not) torn her apart. This is a somewhat unique attitude, in that in most films, the success of the main character is the goal, not the problem.
This film clearly challenges the status quo. If it weren't, drugs, sex and beauty would be depicted very differently. This film promotes positive values because it takes traits commonly thought of as positive (like beauty and excellence), and rips down the smoke and mirrors around those ideas to reveal not so positive inner workings of owning those nearly unattainable labels. This film tells me that my culture is quite dynamic, and that as one ideal comes into place, ideas that oppose it follow and are some are as popular as the original.
For a list of ideas I think your VERY rough draft brings up some very good points. You can also bring up in your actual essay the popular beliefs of over baring/controlling mothers sense you see them in almost everything despite how in real life they are few. You can also talk about how people as they showed in the movie how people put too much belief in letting emotion show through, almost as much as they put too much faith in controlled performances. In your actual essay you should also really drive in the points on beauty and fame, over all I think you’re going to have a great essay.
ReplyDeleteI personally love the movie. The director did a great job of putting the audience in the same disarray that the main character was in. Watching it, you don’t really know what scene is reality and scene what is fantasy, making the link between the two a total blur. The Black Swan might also be commentary on the effects of stress. A big part of it was her mother, but she had also set high standards for herself. A question might be what influenced these high standards? Does our culture push us to expect more of ourselves and what are the results of these expectations (i.e. stress)?
ReplyDeleteI saw this movie quiet some time ago and was very confused about the whole movie. I think I was more disturbed by the movie than anything but that’s not to say it is not a good movie to analyze. I know this is you rough draft but I would go deeper into the target audience. Why is it targeted to women or young women? How is this movie relatable for young women? They have to work hard for anything in life and like Nina she has to work very hard and fight for what she wants. So it shows a part of the real world. I think you have a great start and the right idea.
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