Donnie Darko | Review
“And I find I kind of funny, I find it kind of sad/ The dreams in which I’m dying are the best I’ve ever had/ I find it hard to tell you, I find it hard to take/ When people run in circles it’s a very, very… mad world.” Gary Jule’s version of ‘Mad World’ closed the film ‘Donnie Darko.’ The song fits the theme and eerie tone of the film, and is a great song to end a great film such as ‘Donnie Darko.’Donnie Darko (Gyllenhaal) is a very strange and disturbed teenager. He has two good parents and two sisters, one older, one younger. His family’s average, and they seem fine. However, Donnie’s been plagued with visions lately. Early on in the film, Donnie hears a voice in the middle of the night and follows it, ending up outside his home and in the middle of a golf field. The voice came from Frank, a large and creepy bunny rabbit. Frank tells Donnie that he has 28 days left until the end of the world. Is Donnie crazy and hallucinating, or are these visions real? We’re never quite sure until pretty much the third act and end of the film.
Right after this sleepwalking/vision scene, there’s a really great scene in which the house shakes like crazy. This scene was wonderfully executed, and it’s unexpectedness added to its effectiveness. We find out that an airplane engine fell on Donnie’s house, more specifically his room, which is totally destroyed. No one knows where the engine came from because no airplane has claimed it. This airplane engine is very important, and isn’t referenced again until the ending. Luckily, since Donnie was sleepwalking that night, he managed to avoid the engine crashing through his room.
Everything that happens after this, and for the rest of the film, is very random. The plot involves Donnie’s English teacher (Drew Barrymore), a random little girl, an inspirational speaker (Patrick Swayze), Donnie’s love interest (Jena Malone), and Donnie’s crazy antics. The plot also involves the concept of time travel, and Donnie’s character even looks into it (after the mentioning of it by Frank the bunny rabbit). What’s the point of all these random scenes in the film? I, myself, am still not sure. The ending of the film concerns a well-made plot twist, and some things are answered, but many are still left unanswered. Many events that occurred during the film seem so unimportant to the main plot. What I think is that the director, Richard Kelly, did this purposely in order to make the film opened to interpretation, just like his most recent film, ‘The Box‘, which I also enjoyed.
The thing with Richard Kelly’s ‘Donnie Darko’ and ‘The Box’ is that both are very piecemeal. That is, things happen in bits and pieces. Both films have many random scenes and events that are unexplained, and some people may like open-ended-ness, while others will not. ‘Donnie Darko’ is a very good film and also a cult-classic (No, not “cult” as in a real cult. Just “cult” as in it’s popular and praised by specific groups of fans).
