Hogmannay (New Year’s Eve) was a bit of a wash out this year — all the friends bowed out for illness, weather, or what have you.  Instead, the wife and I hit the movies and saw Black Swan, Darren Aronofsky’s new psychological thriller set in the  world o fNew York ballet.  Ballet…not exactly an interest of mine (or most with a Y chromosome.)

Ready…it’s good.  The story mirrors that of Swan Lake the ballet that the troupe in the movie is to be doing.  Timid and uptight Nina (Natalie Portman) gets tapped to lead as the Swan Queen, despite her inability to open up emotionally — an essential element for dancing the Black Swan, we are told by Vincent Cassel’s director in the movie.

Portman is fantastic in this!  She was — to my mind — always a solid actress, but she’s riveting in this part.  She goes from the pent-up, child-like perfectionist who is — we are told — a superb technician as a dancer; her form and abilities are top-notch, but she is unable to inject passion into her performances.  Her character slowly starts to break these boundaries, seeking that perfect performance…and it causes her to become increasingly unhinged — she starts hallucinating and becomes increasingly violent and sexual.  (Because, these always go together in film…)

Cassel is excellent as the smarmy (but ultimately right concerning her failings and strengths) director.  Mila Kunis is good as the bad-girl that gets Nina to open up, but is also gunning for her job (another parallel to the opera.)  Barabara Hersey knocks it out of the park as the creepy, controlling, coddling mother who let her chances of ballet fame go to have Nina, and now is living vicariously through her daughter.

I was honestly surprised by this flick.  It’s taut and moves along well, but still feels longer than the 110 minute run time.  This isn’t a bad thing — the tension and atmosphere of the movie propel it along, and the voyeuristic quality of the story and the cinematography are compelling. But ultimately, it’s Portman that is the engine for this movie.

Go see it.