Black Swan analysis

I have decided to analysis the film ‘The Black Swan’, in this blog I will focus on the storyline of the film as it strongly links to my groups chosen topic of schizophrenia as the main character suffers from the same mental illness. Something I noticed when watching the film is that throughout tension and suspense is built up through the thoughts Nina Sayers (the main character) and that in my opinion, everything that happens in the film leads up to the final scene. The final scene is the ending of the ballet.  It is Nina’s, first show in which she stars. Nina slowly started to lose her mind and become more like the black swan than the white swan.  Natalie Portman’s acting of this young lady who slowly becomes more and more delusional throughout the film was well done, as it was hard to tell if what was happening was just her delusional mind, or if it was a reality. My group can use this information as I can see that dedicated acting brings out the characters and plot of the film itself.

The final scene shows the beautifully choreographed last dance of the ballet.  The use of lighting in this scene stood out as strong artificial lighting as it is cast down in beams by the stage lights, this could be used to represent the pressure of Nina’s role and the pressure of her mental illness pushing down on her. This added to the emotion of the final act.  Once the ballet is finished, Nina is sprawled out on the mattress, as Thomas Leroy’s character, played by Vincent Cassel, who is her ballet coach comes running over to her screaming “They love you, they love you!”  He then calls her a princess and says “I always knew you had it in you.” We then see her stomach that is drenched in blood, which is a result of a delusion from a previous scene.  When Thomas asks her what she did, she replies “I felt it” he is confused, asks “what?” and she looks at the camera and says “I was perfect.”  We then see a point of view shot of her looking up at the theatre’s lights, and then the shot cuts back to her face as the lights get brighter in her face as it fades to white.  The ending is so fitting because the entire movie was Nina’s struggle to try to be perfect.  She ruined her own sanity in her mind to become the perfect swan with the lead role.  When she felt her part was threatened, there wasn’t anything she wasn’t willing to do to keep her part. It meant the world to her, and in the end, we can see in her eyes that it was all worth it to her; it was all worth it for her to feel like she achieved perfection in that moment.