Requiem for a Dream

I’m writing this as I finish up watching the movie, “Requiem for a Dream“. To be honest, I don’t think I can recommend watching it. It’s a movie that is dark, depressing, and filthy. But what compelled me to check it out was it’s thorough exploration of the depths of human addiction. The vivid scenes depict the hunger that exists deep inside the human soul. Hunger for companionship, love, excitement, success, dreams…peace. But what happens when this hunger starts to get louder and louder and we don’t know how to satisfy it? We look for the nearest prop, the next fix. Soon, that prop no longer simply satisfies this soul hunger, but it in itself sets up a myriad of synaptic (or even chemical) pathways in the brain that make it irresistible.

This movie was excellent in the way that it confronts us with how experientially simple it is to walk down the path of destruction. Every step along the way, these characters rationalized their decisions. Of course something in the back of their mind may have given them pause, but they relentlessly thought they were doing what was right…what was natural. While I was on the Internet Movie Database reading about this movie, I found some interesting facts about how they put it together:

• During Ellen Burstyn’s impassioned monologue about how it feels to be old, cinematographer Matthew Libatique accidentally let the camera drift off-target. When director Darren Aronofsky called “cut” and confronted him about it, he realized the reason Libatique had let the camera drift was because he had been crying during the take and fogged up the camera’s eyepiece. This was the take used in the final print.
• Jared Leto lost 25 lbs and befriended real heroin junkies from Brooklyn to prepare for his role as Harry Goldfarb.
• Director Darren Aronofsky asked Jared Leto and Marlon Wayans to avoid sex and sugar for a period of 30 days in order to better understand an overwhelming craving.

Whoa! They put a lot of effort into this.

I (as well as others who have seen the movie) couldn’t help but wonder if there are things we are addicted to that we don’t realize. Sure I may not be a druggie-porno-gameshow addict. But are those the only addicts that exist? Are we too afraid to stop and take a reflective look at how we live? Are we afraid that we may find our addictions just as sinister, if not more so, because they are so subtle (and, in most cases, legal).

Most people don’t experience the painful hunger shown in the movie. Everyone hungers, but it’s often “under the radar” of our society. We have small cravings and find socially acceptably small props to make ourselves feel better. It’s all about making us feel better. Even though we may not be as depraved as those characters depicted in the movie, we would do well to remember how desperate we can be.