Wild Sound

Filmbrain says the new director’s cut of Donnie Darko is darker and allows for the interpretation that the whole thing was possibly taking place in the mind of a schizophrenic. When I heard there was going to be a director’s cut released I was hoping this would be the case, because that was my original interpretation when I saw it two years ago, but not everyone agreed with me. And I felt the film wasn’t polished enough to give me enough concrete evidence to really argue that it definitely was intended to be read this way. I saw it the first time with students, and gave my argument in class the following week, and was given a healthy debate from students who loved the film but disagreed with my interpretation. Some even stayed after class to argue more. Then I tried it out on some colleagues, who were much more receptive to the idea. But I still had to admit that there wasn’t enough evidence. I saw the film again a few weeks later with my ARCH ENEMY and after seeing it I was even more convinced that I was right. I floated the idea to him and he dismissed it out of hand. “Nah. He just went back in time.”

So now I am eager to see the director’s cut to see if indeed there was intended to be more evidence that it was all a schizophrenic fantasy.

Filed by cynthia rockwell at 2:00 pm under Uncategorized
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