Donnie Darko Psychology

“...What if you could go back in time and take all those hours of pain and darkness and replace them with something better?...” -Gretchen Ross (Donnie Darko)

Donnie Darko was the first feature film from writer and director Richard Kelly, the psychological thriller was originally a box office flop, but over time it has developed an esoteric charm and a massive cult following. The original release of the film also happens to be a personal favourite of mine.

Our story centres around Donnie Darko a troubled teen previously diagnosed with schizophrenia and a history of violence who at 12 o’clock Sunday the 2nd of October 1988 is awoken by a mysterious voice following the voice he is confronted by an otherworldly 6 foot tall bunny rabbit named

Frank who tells him that the world will end in precisely 28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes and 12 seconds. Upon awaking from this vision in the middle of a golf field Donnie discovers that while he was out a large mysterious jet engine crashed through the roof of his bedroom and, had Frank not warned him, would have crushed and killed Donnie. As Donnie gets closer to the prophetic date things get weirder and weirder with Frank urging him to commit violent acts as he proceeds further down the rabbit hole which Frank led him down The initial release of “Darko” was largely regarded as a failure due to its complicated plot. Ideas like time travel, schizophrenia, glorified destruction and chaos, kiddie porn dungeons as well god’s divine plan did not bode well with the average moviegoer and along the events of 911(being that the chaos was set in motion by a mysterious jet engine) did not make for the ideal movie at the time… go figure.

Donnie Darko boasts one of the most original plots in film history, distinguishing it as a cult classic.the main plotline revolves around Donnie being aided by his otherworldly imaginary friend Frank -the six foot tall omnipresent anthropomorphic bunnyman (see what i mean by original) to save the world by unlocking the secret to time travel. Along the way he is encouraged by his new friend to challenge authority and commit destructive acts. Upon my first viewing the plot seemed rather muddled and noncohesive. It just didn't seem like any of the pieces of the puzzle were about to fit together right up until the end of the movie, warning do not take this films plot lightly this is not a film where you can doze off and expect to understand anything afterwards, this movie will require you to think and pay attention in order for it to tell its story in full. However I found the unpredictability and seemingly senseless sequence of events to add to the mysterious and esoteric charm of the film. In fact this lack of information and mechanics behind the plot of the original release gives “Darko” its unique character. However many plot devices were put into the film in the extended cut of the film by adding in shots of an iris with visual effect overtop and providing visual excerpts from the book ”The Philosophy Of Time Travel” and to me this took away something of a personality from the film and made the nature Darko’s form of time travel seem rather silly . Of course this movie like many other time travel movies plot raise more than a few questions such as “why did the jet engine fall through Donnie’s room?” or “why did Frank urge him to commit such violent acts to cause utter chaos?” and “how exactly does one suck a fuck?”

From the opening credits to the unforgettable climax, Richard Kelly creates an eerie atmosphere, using filming techniques such as low lighting, a series of meticulously choreographed tracking shots and various visual effects to draw the audience further into the rabbit hole into Darko’s ethereal world of darkness and wonder. For instance watery shots of Frank in the bathroom and the sped up and slowed down continuous tracking shots were very effective in turning a suburban area like middlesex into a fantastical wonderland similar to that of Lewis Carroll taking viewers further down the rabbit hole Donnie has followed Frank into. As an advocate of the earlier release of the film i dislike the 20 minutes of extra footage in the director's cut of the film as they are mostly shots overlapped by excerpts from “The Philosophy Of Time Travel” as they revealed the mechanics behind Donnie’s journey through time and removed the atmosphere of mystery surrounding it and the film no longer has the same vibe of mystery. Along with the texts about the philosophy of time travel the extra footage also included images of what appeared to be computer code and american stock footage with an early computer monitor effect. I found this took away from the occult nature of the original and were seemingly pointless.

“Donnie Darko” is probably the first film that boosted actor Jake Gyllenhaal (Donnie Darko) into his career.

Kelly needed Donnie to be convincing as a troubled teen with psychological problems. Enter Jake Gyllenhaal whose only film experience was 1999s “october sky” (-another good but severely underrated film). In Jake Gyllenhaal Kelly finds an actor that is able to portray our sleepy eyed mentally unstable protagonist. Gyllenhaal relays an intriguing kind of disturbed, he is more curious of the events than frightened by them and creates the intimidating charisma and confidence of someone wise beyond their years and sets the perfect tone as the protagonist of this film. On the other hand Jena Malone's performance was unsatisfactory. Jena Malone plays the character Gretchen Ross the new girl in town who soon becomes Donnie’s love interest Gretchen ross’s portrayal was disappointing on so many levels. Outside of the obvious kissing and spending time together it was hard to tell whether or not Gretchen truly cared for Donnie. Malone seemed so wooden and bland it was really hard for me to develop any sort of positive feelings toward her character as she is not particularly likable her performance could be compared to that of cardboard chips or the colour beige it wasn’t outright bad it just wasn't extremely interesting and aside from one or two scenes she seemed completely two dimensional as a character and because of this (spoilers ahead) I found it hard to care when she was accidentally run over and killed by the real

Frank.

Overall “Donnie Darko” is one of my favourite films. It has a certain mysterious and ethereal charm to it that only gets better with each viewing. With its completely unforgettable plot reinforced by the unsettling and foreboding atmosphere created by Kelly and Gyllenhaal as more and more of Kelly's vision is unveiled every time. With each watching you feel closer to, but never completely understanding, the seemingly random occult set of events that occur in this small suburban town and the twisted psyche of a manic paranoid teenager who knows that the world is ending around him. the story of Donnie Darko was purposely scripted to leave viewers with more questions after watching and though we are left with some form of resolution in the end, even if we never find out how one sucks a fuck.