Donnie Darko: Director's Cut Review

[Daytripper]

First one I've seen, and it's GOOD!

Added footage gives 'Darko' new depth

By SEAN AXMAKER
SPECIAL TO THE POST-INTELLIGENCER

Donnie Darko (Jake Gyllenhaal) is an otherwise normal rebellious, angry kid who slumps and frumps his way through the confusion of his life. He just happens to have a little more confusion than most of us, much of it caused by visitations from a demonic looking 6-foot rabbit named Frank, who tells him that the world is going to end in 26 days.


MOVIE REVIEW
DONNIE DARKO: DIRECTOR'S CUT

DIRECTOR: Richard Kelly

CAST: Jake Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone,

Mary McDonnell, Holmes Osborne,

Drew Barrymore

RUNNING TIME: 133 minutes

RATING: R for language, some

drug use and violence

WHERE: Bella Bottega, East Valley 13, Grand Cinemas Alderwood, Uptown, Varsity

GRADE: A


In Richard Kelly's visually imaginative and intellectually challenging debut film, Donnie is a contemporary Holden Caulfield in a grim and glorious world of nightmares and dreams: jet engines fall from an empty sky and alternate realities and time travel are as present as teen angst and high school melodrama. At least they are to Donnie, who can suddenly see the fabric of fate in the ectoplasmic trajectories that lead us to our destiny.

But it's also a frustrating world in which fatuous platitudes are offered in place of practical advice, where censorship hangs over dedicated teachers like a sword of Damocles, and where teenagers aren't trusted to handle the complexities of the world, even through the mirror of literature and philosophy.

Fiction predicted reality perfectly. Distributors thought that young audiences wouldn't understand the film and gave it a disastrous release to an urban adult audience in 2001. It was DVD that transformed it from box office flop to home video cult hit, a veritable phenomenon among teens and tweens, who connect with its inarticulate hero and debate the film in chat rooms, discussion forums and fan Web sites.

Using the momentum from its home video success, the producers are relaunching the film, hoping to find the audience that eluded it the first time around and entice the converted into the theater with a big screen experience and an even denser cinematic presentation.

While 20 minutes of additional footage doesn't transform the film, it enriches the characters (tender new scenes between Donnie and his family makes the heady conclusion even more devastating) and gives the science fiction underpinnings a stronger philosophy (albeit one closer to Philip K. Dick than Stephen Hawking).

But even while it "explains" Donnie's odyssey more clearly, it paradoxically opens the film up to alternate interpretations. Whether you think the tangent universe of "Donnie Darko" is real, dreamed or a schizophrenic hallucination, the wonderfully weird trip leaves you with meaty questions, both metaphysical and moral, and a journey through time-space that is, if anything, even more philosophically invigorating and emotionally intense.

[bsktballDude1]

Sounds good...hopefully when it comes to theaters it will be in my area.

[scott1598]

just...
can't...
wait...
for...
it...
to...
hit...
DVD!!
it will hit soon...right?????

[riley_dude]

I didnt see it in theatres but remember reading some great stuff about it so I bought the DVD and love the movie. If only audiences would give it a try, they might like it.
Maybe Jake's popularity will grow after Day After Tomorrow and people will go see him in D.D.

[PopcornTreeCt]

I give the movie a thumbs up for attempting to be philosophical it was still a jumbled mess. Hopefully the Directors Cut will make a little bit more sense.

[Jackskeleton]

Originally posted by scott1598
just...
can't...
wait...
for...
it...
to...
hit...
DVD!!
it will hit soon...right?????

screw dvd, Give me theater listings and times Stat!

[cleaver]

And I just bought the old DVD. Damn.

[scott1598]

Originally posted by cleaver
And I just bought the old DVD. Damn.

that's alright..i'm sure you didn't pay more than $10.00..so not too bad, right?

[Daytripper]

Originally posted by cleaver
And I just bought the old DVD. Damn.

No big, it's not the same movie. Well, not exactly. The difference is the twenty minutes of deleted scenes incorporated back into the film (some of which weren't on the DVD as extras), upgraded special effects and more 80's songs thrown in on the soundtrack. Bring it on.

[slop101]

If it's just the same movie with the deleted scenes from the dvd thrown in, I'm gonna have to pass, as I think all the deleted scenes were deleted with good reason.

[Daytripper]

Originally posted by slop101
If it's just the same movie with the deleted scenes from the dvd thrown in, I'm gonna have to pass, as I think all the deleted scenes were deleted with good reason.

And what exactly would that reason be?

[AnonomusBob15]

I enjoyed the deleted scenes on the DVD. Particularly the one where Donnie and his dad are bonding and his dad admits to haveing been a little "crazy" back in his day.

On the commentaries for the deleted scenes Kelly admits to not wanting to have deleted them due to the fact that he thought they fleshed out the characters a little bit more than in the final movie.

[Daytripper]

A friend of mine clued me in on site deticated to the director (richard-kelly.net). And in a forum on that site, someone posted a link to another site called www.matrixcommunity.org where someone posted their review and the Q/A about the film. I tried posting the link and it didn't work for some reason. So I'm cutting and pasting both. Sorry (mods). It's long and *******SPOILERS********** :


I'm going to assume that everyone reading this has seen the theatrical release of Donnie Darko so I won't try to hold back on spoilers of the story. I will though black out some of the changes that occur in the Director's Cut in case you don't want to know about them before seeing it. But I can't guarantee anything. So in a paragraph or two I'll let you know that if you read any further you're likely to read some Director's Cut spoilers.

Here's a quick non-spoilerish review.
I think the best thing about the Director's Cut is that Kelly managed to make the film a little more accessible to a wider audience without dumbing it down or compromising anything. The new material made for the film makes it a little more coherent and makes it seem a little more complete. Much of it is stuff that's already familiar to fans of the movie who delved into the website and the DVD, but for a first time viewer, the Director's Cut gives them this knowledge and information in a way that makes the events of the film a little more logical. But it doesn't explain everything. There's still a lot of mystery to it. I heard one person say behind me that he liked that the new stuff was in the Director's Cut, but felt that had it been there in the first theatrical release, he probably wouldn't have felt the need to watch it several times to figure it out. And that's probably true. The Director's Cut will seem more satisfying to the first time viewer than the first Theatrical Release. But some of the newer material adds more layers to the film and prompts more questions. So all in all, it's a great version of the movie. I liked it better as a whole because of the incorporation of the extra material and for the new elements. The original was just under two hours. The festival website sites this version as being 133 minutes long.

Okay, now here's my review of the new stuff. Spoilers follow. So if you don't want to know what's up with the Director's Cut, don't read anymore. I'll write up the Q&A stuff afterwards, and will try and label the questions and answers that have spoilers.
-----------
From what I could tell, all of the deleted scenes were re-integrated into the film, plus some new material that I didn't remember from the DVD. It all worked fantastically. The new material added some more depth to some of the characters. I noticed some subtle changes that kind of enhanced the Darko family relationships. Especially between Donnie and his father. There was one great scene where they sit outside at a picnic table and chat about whether or not Donnie is crazy. It was a great little exchange that I'd never seen before. I'm quite sure it wasn't in the theatrical release, and if it was on the DVD I missed it. I don't own it so I can't check, and it's been a few months since I've the theatrical release. But it was a cool scene.
There was also a short scene in the Hotel between the father and the mother where the dad talks about Donnie dodging his bullet. I didn't remember that particular line.
The first change I noticed was in the opening music that plays while Donnie rides his bike back to his house after waking up in the road up in the hills. In the theatrical release this was Echo and the Bunnymen's "Killing Moon". In the director's cut, it was INXS' "Never Tear Us Apart". I kind of missed "Killing Moon", but I think it just may be that I like that song better. Kelly said he always intended it to be INXS's song though and that it was actually written into the script and edited for that song. It works great though.

The other most significant change, other than all the deleted scenes being added, were some new montages that took place at moments when Donnie begins to have his "visions". They reminded me a lot of the quick flashes that Darren Aronofsky used in "Requiem for a Dream" when the characters were shooting up or popping pills. These montages were always over a full screen shot of the Iris of an eye as it slowly dilates open. The first couple times it's just the eye, with a final flash of Frank the Bunny's head in the pupil. Later we start to get some other elements incorporated into the background, like fire, water, waves crashing, then even later some techy little additions like srolling lines of unreadable text, like on a computer. Later we get a grid over lay and in the final sequence we get some split screens of other scenes from the film, playing backwards in the end. And one interesting thing is at the very end, we get this montage effect for quite a long time as we watch scenes from the movie play backwards very fast, we travel through the wormhole and near the end of the sequence, the word "Purge" appears like a close up of a computer text on a monitor. I think I remember it appearing full screen and then shrinking down into a smaller video frame in the corner. I loved this effect, and the way it progresses is very effective. Seeing it up on the big screen was just breathtaking too! Probably my favorite part of the Director's Cut. And I like it too because it adds another little layer to the onion as it were. It's something else to try and make sense of.
---------------------------

Now for the Donnie Darko Director's Cut Q&A:

Okay these are the questions I remember that were asked. The director's comments and answers are all paraphrased since I didn't record it. But you'll get the general idea of what was said. They're probably a little out of order too.

Q: The organizer asked the first question. She told him that as a first time director, to have gotten a movie this good, this complex, and so offbeat, made in the first place is in itself a rarity. But not many first time directors get to see the only film they've ever done, released as a Director's Cut only 3 years later, and especially theatrically. She then asked him "How in the hell did you do it?!!"

A:Kelly's answer was that he was that he was a just a lucky, lucky bastard. Then he said it really was because of the fans. He said everyone involved in the film were very surprised at how well it did on DVD. Especially where they didn't market it at all. It was just a "grassroots" groundswell and word of mouth buzz that really launched it. So he then told the audience "it's because of you guys that we're all standing here tonight, so thank you!" And if I remember correctly at that point Drew turned to the audience and said "you guys Rock!" Of course, big round of applause for the that.

{Spoiler}
Q: Someone asked if the inclusion of the chapters and pages of the "Philosophy of Time Travel" book was something he wanted to do in the first place or was it something that came after.
A: Kelly said that he actually wrote the text of the Time Travel book during the editing process. He said it was always there in the back of his mind during the writing and filming, but it was king of fuzzy. It all came into focus during the editing. So they put it on the DVD and the internet and he felt including the portions of it that he did in the Director's cut helped make it a little more coherent, and rounded the movie out a lot more. He also liked the idea that for first time or casual movie goers who see the Director's cut they'll get the information from the book in the movie itself instead of having to search for it afterwards.
{/Spoiler}

Q: Someone told him about how this movie is being debated about all over the internet and how there seem to be hundreds of different interpretations and rumors about it. What are a couple of the misconceptions that you've heard of that you'd like to clear up once and for all.

A: He said that a lot of people think the Rabbit is evil. The rabbit is not evil. Not at all. He's just more of a guide helping Donnie figure out what he needs to do.
Another one is that he said a lot of people think this is a movie about mental illness. He said he doesn't see it that way at all. He sees it more as a science fiction movie, not so much because of the Time Travel, but because he sees Donnie as having been contacted by an intelligence. Donnie's got a job to do and there are huge consequences if he fails. Donnie realizes that the more things transgress. He said he thinks in the movie that Donnie has been contacted by an intelligence that is feeding the information he needs to complete the job. Whether it's an intelligence from the far, far future, or something else entirely we don't know. One think he likes to think the movie says is that maybe there is no such thing as mental illness. Maybe those people that we label as schizophrenics or whatever are just open to a lot more information than the rest of us. This got a little round of applause.

Other misconceptions come from the commentary of the DVD. He said him and Jake were joking around a lot on that and some of the things they said were just them kidding around. For instance, the rumor that Donnie Wahlberg (he mentioned someone else too) were offered the role of Donnie is just not true.
Another one is that they didn't have to digitally remove Jake's private parts in post production from the hypnosis scene. Remember when Donnie unbuttons his pants and reaches down there to fondle himself when the psychiatrist is asking him about girls and school. He said he doesn't know wher that idea came from but it's not true.

{Spoiler}
Q: Someone wanted to know why he changed the opening music to the INXS song "Never Tear Us Apart".
A: In the theatrical release, Echo and The Bunnymen's "Killing Moon" plays as Donnie rides his bike back home from the hills. He said it was always intended that way. In the script he even wrote it in to play over that scene. It sounded like they even edited it that way, and it does work well. He never did explain why he didn't use it in the first place. I wonder if perhaps there was a licensing issue or something.
{Spoiler}

Q: Continuing with the music, someone asked if he'd heard from either of the guys from Tears For Fears. He said it's obvious that their music is important to the film and he must be a big fan. Had he heard from them about how they felt about the movie.
A: Kelly said he hadn't heard personally from them, but when Gary Jules was touring Europe and his cover of "Mad World" was #1, Gary met both Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith and he said it sounds like because of people rediscovering their music, there's talk of a Tears For Fears reunion and a new album. He also said everyone else was very cool about letting them use their music. He said the guys from Echo and The Bunnymen sent him an autographed Box Set. He said Aimee Man let them have her "Voices Carry" for peanuts. She apparently went to the same High School that Kelly did (not at the same time), but she was very, very supportive. He said everyone who let them use their music was very cool and very supportive.

Q: The guy sitting next to me, and odd fellow I must add, wanted to know if he had any plans to do a sequel?
A: Before the director could say anything there was kind of a collective groan. He smiled and said No. He said he liked sequels and thought there were some great ones, but only when they're necessary. And he said he saw no reason that a sequel was necessary for Donnie Darko. Huge Round of Applause! He then turned to Jena and Mary and said "Not that I don't want to work with you talented ladies again. I do definitely want to work together again, but no, not in a Donnie Darko sequel." They both seemed as thrilled as the audience.

{Spoiler}
Q: Someone asked about the Eye montages. He wanted to know if the eye was something they shot with the first movie and didn't use or was it shot for the Director's cut. He also asked whose eye it was, and could he tell us what it symbolized.
A:Kelly seemed reluctant to answer both questions. He kind of dodged the "whose eye was it" question by saying that the eye was something they shot for the Director's cut but he didn't really want to get into whose eye it was or how they shot it. He said he always did kind of imagine the eye sequence but never got around to doing the first time. He said it kind of had something to do with the Deus Ex Machina idea that's talked about in the movie. He actually seemed kind of puzzled about the eye himself, which I found kind of interesting. It sounded like there were a few elements of the movie that even he wasn't quite sure what they were exactly. About the eye and the Deus Ex Machina reference, he said you could look at the eye both figuratively, or literally. Literally it you could say it was Donnie's eye and he was seeing it as part of his visions that were directing him along, or you could see it figuratively, kind of like an "eye of God" or something like that. He said you'll notice that overlay of the technological elements, the grid, the digital code, later the split screens and text, could mean that this eye was part of the intelligence that was directing the information being fed to Donnie. But then you have to think that the technological elements are far more advanced looking than anything that would have been seen in 1988, so maybe it was an eye from the distance future. He said "I don't know" quite a bit when describing the eye sequences, and you kind of got a feeling that these sequences were almost as puzzling to him as they were to us. Which I found kind of cool. Almost like they were visions of his own that he was still trying to figure out.
{Spoiler}

There was a group of film students from USC who traveled up to see the premiere, driving more than 14 hours one guy said, and a few of them asked about what advice he had for aspiring directors. He said the most important thing he could tell them was to just believe in your material. Make your material so good that they can't say no. And if you want to maintain creative control, if that's something that's important to you, don't give it up. He said when he was trying to get Donnie Darko made, the studios kept wanting to just buy the script from him and let someone else direct it. He kept refusing. He said some of the people at the studio were actually quite annoyed at him for not giving it up. They'd go for a few months and then come back with the attitude of "so are you ready to sell us that script yet?" and his response was only if I get to direct it. Sounded like it drove them nuts. They kept offering him little movies to direct first but he didn't want to do that. One movie he said they kept insisting he direct first was something called "Valentine". I've never heard of it. The audience just kind of laughed. Kelly said "Y'know I'm sure it was a great movie, but I can't really say for sure because I've never seen it. But it wasn't my movie. I wanted to direct my movie." Eventually he said he sent the script to a few people he had in mind for certain roles, most specifically Drew Barrymore. He said Drew immediately signed on and starting talking up his script and pulling strings. And he kind of laughed and said it kind of amazing how quickly the ball started rolling once Drew started showing interest. Then he said the more actors that signed on to the thing or started showing interest, the more momentum it gathered and it eventually got to the point that the studio couldn't refuse anymore. So his advice was to just believe in your material so much that you make other people believe in it too.
Someone asked how useful to his success was his experiences at USC's filmschool. He said for him it was very important, but he said he thinks it was because he made his education important. He said he used the resources available there, used the faculty and just did everything he could to get the most out of the resources available. So he said Yes, filmschool was important to him. But did he think that you needed to go to filmschool to be a good, successful screenwriter, or director, and the answer was absolutely not. He said you can go to the shittiest community college in the world and still get a good education, it just depended on how much you put into it.

So there ya go. That's all I could think of for now. I'm sure I'll think of more to add. But I got some time this morning to type this up and wanted to get posted for you guys as soon as possible.
Definitely go see this in the theater if you get the chance. If you're a fan, you'll love it.

[steebo777]

I need to see this ASAP.

[LiquidSky]

I cannot wait to see it!!!

[slop101]

I really hope they don't show that scene with Donnie dead after the engine has crashed in his room.

Also, I'm not a fan of over-explaining things (or even explaining things at all), which is what I feel the deleted scenes would do - it would take away a sense of mystery and intrigue that was the film's best quality - you take those away when you put in some of the the extra scenes and you're left with just another "quirky" movie.

[squi23]

Ummm.... did I miss, somewhere up above, how long they plan on letting us wait to see this?

The sooner I can see the theatrical release of the director's cut, the sooner I can buy the director's cut dvd!!!!

[scott1598]

Is there any news on a DVD release for DC?

[FuzzyBallz]

I hope Frank will get more screen time in this one.

[Hokeyboy]

There's a difference between "not explaining everything" and "not explaining anything." Donnie Darko excelled at the latter.

Any film that has to refer you to a book, website, pamphlet, ancient scroll, etc. to explain critical plot points is a weak movie, no matter how well acted or directed. Since the new cut is supposed to expand the story and make certain plot developments clearer, it does sound like a marked improvement.

And I do admit, the director Q&A did sound a bit tantalizing.