History Film / BlackSwan

* GoodBadGirl: Lily enjoys casual sex, drinking, and drugs, but she's a very kind person and doesn't seem weirded out when Nina accidentally confesses to having had a HomoeroticDream about her. [[spoiler: Even all her seemingly bitchy moments were imagined by Nina. She really is as nice as she acts.]]

* HomoeroticDream: Lily and Nina's sex scene. Possibly.

* ArtReflectsPersonality: This is a major issue for Nina in performing the main role of Odette/Odile. She's TheIngenue: sheltered, innocent, gifted at dancing with a ShrinkingViolet personality. This shows up in her dancing and is why she is initially cast in the main role of the beautifully innocent Odette. However, to perform the Odile part, the dancer has to be much more aggressive, flirtatious, and sensual to get across that this is a fake Odette being impersonated by an evil witch. Nina struggles to exude the necessary amounts of sensuality for the role, which leads to a boat load of anxiety about being replaced manifesting in some MindScrew, maybe real, maybe imagined horror.

* BlackComedy: The movie does have the occasional moment where one thinks "should I really be laughing at this?". There are many moments of BlackComedy stuck in the middle of horrific or dramatic scenes.

** Thomas' talk about the fact that Beth's self-destructive tendencies were what made her so compelling.

** Thomas' apartment is filled with blacks and grays, and the studio itself is mainly white and black with touches of grey.
** On their night out itself, Nina puts on Lily's black top over her white top and then wears a grey sweatshirt over that. She then proceeds to wear a lot of grey for the rest of the movie. When Nina returns to the studio after the party scene, many of the palettes are swapped—characters that were wearing black are now wearing white, and vice versa.

** It certainly is a kind of ComingOfAgeStory. Even though Nina is a woman, she is immature; she is going through experiences that usually occur much earlier in a girls life (body image issues, coming to terms with sexuality) and are part of the difficult transition to adulthood. The difficulty is compounded by the fact that Nina seems to have been cosseted by her mother in a childish bedroom, being her mother's little girl... she is socially and sexually inexperienced... and she is very mentally ill.

* CreepyBallet: Ballerina Nina begins to lose her mind when she is cast as the roles of the White and Black Swans in her company's staging of ''Swan Lake'', since the pressure from her mother, director, and rivals don't let up. She starts to become self-destructive both physically and mentally, and begins to hallucinate an evil doppelganger.

* ADarkerMe: Nina's 's 'Black Swan' persona. Much of the films revolves around her trying to become this.
* DarkIsEvil: The Black Swan and Rothbart. Subverted for [[spoiler: Lily, who wears black a lot, but isn't actually a bad person]].

** There's also Thomas, the dancers' middle aged instructor who is strongly implied to have a penchant for sexually grooming his leads.
* DisappearedDad: Nina's father is never seen. He's only mentioned indirectly; when discussing Thomas' possible romantic pursuit of Nina, Erica states "I don't want you to make the same mistake I did". He was/is most likely working in ballet, quite possibly even in a position similar to Thomas'.

* EmbarrassingRingtone: [[InvertedTrope Inverted]], as Nina's ringtone is [[https://youtu.be/9cNQFB0TDfY?t=10 Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake theme]] [[note]]As this takes place in 2010, it's not a proper .mp3 audio but a beep-beep-beep rendition of it, but still instantly recognizable.[[/note]], which would be cheesy on other persons but for her it's FridgeBrilliance.

* FalseFriend: Nina sees Lily as this, but in truth she isn't false and may not even be a friend.

** The crowning moment, as well as the hardest to watch scene in the film, is when Nina is at the opening season ceremony in the bathroom. She notices a hangnail on her middle finger and proceeds to pick at it, and... well... this scene was nominated for "Biggest Jaw Dropping Moment" at the MTV awards to give some idea of how bad the next bit is. Thankfully, it turns out to be a hallucination afterwards.

** At the club, when Nina and Lily are dancing, the butterflies from Nina's room briefly appear on the left side of the screen, as does the moon, reflecting the line about going "to the moon and back." At the same time, some barely noticeable face switching between Nina and Lily occurs, and Nina's Black Swan eye makeup appears for a split-second. Additionally, the guy that Nina is dancing with morphs into Rothbart several times (he also appears in the background in some frames), and at one point his face morphs into that of Thomas. Also, Nina's White Swan costume appears in a few frames, as does the Icarus statue. Blurred imagery of a nude woman can be seen in at least three frames, as well. Plus, in several of the frames, the people in the background are often distorted and out-of-focus. As well as... loads of other surreal imagery. The sequence can be viewed [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmkIiBVgCOg here]].

** There are a few occasions when different people suddenly turn into Nina's doppelgänger for a few seconds, something which can be hard to miss—an early example is the random passer-by near the beginning of the film. There's also [[spoiler:Lily during the sex scene and during the earlier scene when she smokes with Nina in the ballet studio, Beth during the nail file scene, and four of the backup dancers during the actual performance of ''Swan Lake''.]]

* GoodBadGirl: Lily enjoys casual sex, drinking, and drugs, but she's a very kind person, and doesn't seem weirded out when Nina accidentally confesses to having had a HomoeroticDream about her. [[spoiler:Even all her seemingly bitchy moments were imagined by Nina. She really is as nice as she acts.]]

* IdentityBreakdown: The entire is Nina having one as she struggles to prepare for the dual role in ''Swan Lake.'' She struggles to reconcile her personality with the demands of the role, eventually becoming paranoid to the point of hallucinating an EvilCounterpart that is the manifestation of the Black Swan persona she both seeks [[EnemyWithin and represses]]. This reaches its climax at the end when [[spoiler:Nina [[BecomingTheMask embraces the Black Swan persona]] and performs the role, until she collapses mid-performance as she is bleeding out from a self-inflicted stab wound she gave herself while hallucinating.]]

* PopularityCycle: It is emphasized over and over that only one dancer can be top of Thomas's estimation for any period of time and, due to the physical and time pressures on ballerinas, it's always a fairly short time. At first it's Beth, but when she grows too old and is forced to quit, Thomas completely abandons her, and causes her to go the way of WentCrazyWhenTheyLeft, [[spoiler:ultimately smashing her own leg in to be free of her own ambition.]] Nina then fights her way into Thomas's affections to win the role of the Swan Queen, but is almost immediately threatened by her alternate Lily, who Thomas constantly contrasts with the uptight Nina. When Nina finally gives a brilliant performance, Thomas calls her his "little princess", his nickname for Beth, highlighting that she's taken on Beth's role - and it may end the same way [[spoiler:unless it really was just a DyingDream.]]

* RoomFullOfCrazy: Erica's room full of paintings.

** Possibly coincidental, but the scene where Nina flips out, destroys her room and throws out her stuffed animals - in addition to struggling with a MadonnaWhoreComplex and becoming (or trying to become) ADarkerMe - is reminiscent of the scene in ''Film/BatmanReturns'' where Selina Kyle becomes Catwoman.

%%* LipstickLesbian: Lily and Nina. Or is it?

* SpiritualSequel: See above.
* SpiritualSuccessor: To ''Film/TheWrestler'', according to Aronofsky. It's pretty much that movie's foil: ''Wrestler'' is about finding beauty in a brutal sport while ''Swan'' is all about the brutality of a beautiful artform.

* MyBelovedSmother: Nina's mother, Erica. Nina still lives with her and she treats Nina like a child to an absolutely disturbing degree. Erica expressed disapproval when she thinks Nina has ''pierced her ears,'' [[BigShutUp let alone]] when Nina admits she had casual sex with two men. She also undresses her adult daughter, clips her fingernails for her, and puts her to bed every night.

* BigWhat: Beth's reaction to seeing Nina, after Nina watched her have a fit in her dressing room.

** Nina literally means "little girl" and is often used in diminutives of Russian names, showing how babied she is by [[MyBelovedSmother Erica,]] as well as connecting her to ''Swan Lake'', which was a Russian ballet. And when chanted by a crowd it sounds something like bird-noises. Her last name, Sayers, could be something of a ShoutOut too: Zelda Sayres, wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald, was an ambitious ballerina who came very close to making it big professionally, but who was also schizophrenic.

-->'''Nina''': Don't come in here!
-->'''Erica''': ''(struggling to open Nina's bedroom door)'' What's this?
-->'''Nina''': It's called privacy! I'm not twelve anymore!
-->'''Erica''': You're not my Nina right now!
-->'''Nina''': ''Leave me alone!''
* MoodSwinger: Erica... has some issues.
* MoodWhiplash: Several, but none more severe than when Nina is first doing her ''[[UnusualEuphemism homework]]'' and rolls over to find her mother sleeping in an armchair next to her.

* ADateWithRosiePalms: Nina herself. Also, let's not forget the [[NightmareFuel nightmare-inducing]] train scene.

** Whenever Nina [[ADateWithRosiePalms is enjoying a private moment with herself]], THE SWANS ARE WATCHING—there's a black swan stuffed animal in her bedroom, visible when she touches herself in bed, and there's a white swan on the bathroom tile behind her head when she's in the bathtub. Not to mention all of the weird face-switches.

* OhCrap: Nina wakes up and begins to... um... [[ADateWithRosiePalms follow Thomas' instructions]]. Just as she nears her happy moment, she turns to her right... and sees her mother asleep in the chair. Needless to say, this kills the mood.

* YouNeedToGetLaid: The reason why Thomas assigns Nina [[ADateWithRosiePalms "homework."]]

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:Whether or not Nina died from her chest wound, she at least—in her own damaged mind—achieved perfection.]] However, Natalie Portman thinks that [[spoiler: Nina does ''not'' die, but rather her injury represents her [[CharacterDevelopment killing the girl to mature into a woman]].]]

-->'''Erica''': ''struggling to open Nina's bedroom door'' What's this?

** Lily is harder: It's similar sounding to Odile, the name of the Black Swan from ''Theatre/SwanLake''. The name is also reminiscent of Lilith, infamous demon and seductress of the night. The Lily flower symbolizes purity and the color white, as well as death and resurrection- all of these are particularly appropriate at the end of the film. On a probably unintentional but still interesting note, "lily" is the translation of the word "[[{{GirlsLove}} yuri]]".

* AlphaBitch: Veronica has shades of this.
* AmbiguousDisorder: Nina seems to suffer from paranoid schizophrenia (her visual and auditory hallucinations, delusional thoughts, and paranoid mistrust of others point to this), is very socially awkward and shy, and is strongly implied to have an eating disorder.

* BalefulPolymorph: In parallel with the plot of ''Swan Lake'', Nina seems to think this is actually happening to her.

* BodyHorror: All over the place. Some is TruthInTelevision squick showing the physical toll that this sort of intense regime can have on a dancer, and some is pure, David Cronenberg-style madness, with BalefulPolymorph and self-mutilation.

''Black Swan'' is a 2010 {{psychological thriller}} {{horror}} film by Creator/DarrenAronofsky -- and my, is it ''ever'' a Darren Aronofsky film.

''Black Swan'' is a 2010 {{psychological thriller}} {{horror}} film by Creator/DarrenAronofsky -- and boy, is it ''ever'' a Darren Aronofsky film.

''Black Swan'' is a 2010 {{psychological thriller}} film by Creator/DarrenAronofsky -- and boy, is it ''ever'' a Darren Aronofsky film.

* ArtisticLicenseArt: In real life, any ballet company doing more than a one-off gala performance of ''Swan Lake'' (or any ballet at all!) will have multiple casts, with dancers alternating performances -- and this is especially true for a ballet like ''Swan Lake'', which is so strenuous on the leads. In real life, Nina would have been one of several dancers assigned to perform the role.[[note]]For reference, for a six-show run of ''Swan Lake'', the famed New York City Ballet cast no less than ''three'' of its principal dancers to perform the role -- for only six shows! Going along with this, the idea that a company would only have one principal female dancer is absurd -- most of the world-class companies have close to a dozen.[[/note]] But not in Hollywoodland.

'''Thomas:''' Stop saying that! That's exactly what I'm talking about! Stop being so ''[[PrecisionFStrike fucking weak]]''!
* BigAppleSauce: The film takes place in New York.
* BigShutUp: Erica lets one rip at Nina after she comes home after her drink-and-drug fueled night out:
--> '''SHUT YOUR MOUTH!'''

Competition soon emerges in Lily (Creator/MilaKunis), a new dancer who is charming the director Thomas Leroy (Creator/VincentCassel), and the polar opposite of Nina. When the dual nature of the two parts she plays in the production forces Nina to confront her own inner conflict of sexual repression, the pressure of the role and Nina's obsessive desire to give a [[ThePerfectionist perfect performance]] threaten to drive her [[SanitySlippage over the edge.]]

* ArtisticLicenseArt: In real life, any ballet company doing more than a one-off gala performance of ''Swan Lake'' (or any ballet at all!) will have multiple casts, with dancers alternating performances -- and this is especially true for a ballet like ''Swan Lake'', which is so strenuous on the leads. In real life, Nina would have been one of several dancers assigned to perform the role.[[note]]Going along with this, the idea that a company would only have one principal female dancer is absurd -- most of the world-class companies have close to a dozen.[[/note]] But not in Hollywoodland.

* {{Homage}}: In addition to ''Swan Lake'', there's also some to Creator/EdgarAllanPoe[='s=] ''William Wilson'', about a man with an opposite-natured doppelganger. It's also worth mentioning that Aronofsky owns the rights to ''Anime/PerfectBlue'' from when he used a scene from it as direct reference for ''Film/RequiemForADream''. The entire film is almost a homage-remake in a sense.

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:Whether or not Nina died from her chest wound, she at least—in her own damaged mind—achieved perfection.]] However, Natalie Portman thinks that [[spoiler: Nina does ''not'' die, but rather her injury represents her [[CharacterDevelopment killing the girl to mature into a woman]].]].

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:Whether or not Nina died from her chest wound, she at least—in her own damaged mind—achieved perfection.]] However, [[Natalie Portman thinks]] that [[spoiler: Nina does ''not'' die, but rather her injury represents her [[CharacterDevelopment killing the girl to mature into a woman]].]].