Ellen Burstyn, Jennifer Connelly, Marlon Wayans, Jared Leto, Christopher McDonald

Sara Goldfarb is a lonely widow who is revitalized by the prospect of appearing on television as a game show contestant, while her son Harry, his girlfriend Marion, and his friend Tyrone have devised ...( read more  read more... )an illicit shortcut to wealth and ease. Lulled by early successes, Sara, Harry, Marion and Tyrone convince themselves that unforeseen setbacks are only temporary. They ignore their deteriorating circumstances and focus all their energies on realizing their beautiful visions of the future. Even as the promise of fulfillment disappears to nothingness, they cling to the delusions that are slowly destroying their lives, denying reality until at last they are eye to eye with their worst nightmares.

Flixster Users

93% liked it

281,204 ratings

Critics

80% liked it

122 critics

R, 1 hr. 42 min.

Directed by: Darren Aronofsky

Release Date: October 6, 2000

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DVD Release Date: May 22, 2001

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Stats: 31,130 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (31,130)


  • February 4, 2010
    One of the weirdest movies I've ever attempted to watch...Yes, I said attempted. After about 20 minutes, all I could do was fast forward.
  • December 28, 2009
    ''You are my dream.''

    The hopes and dreams of four ambitious people are shattered when their drug addictions begin spiraling out of control.

    Ellen Burstyn: Sara Goldfarb

    From Darren Aronofsky, I found this his most disturbing, most crushingly shocking yet.
    Ellen...( read more) Burstyn is fantastic as the lonely Sara Goldfarb. Jared Leto, Jennifer Connelly and Marlon Wayans equally convincing, beautiful desperate acting.
    Sean Gullette and Mark Margolis (from Pi) also had brief cameo roles in this. I really feel that there is a bond between a Director and his actors when they reuse them in films. Shows me there is a good working relationship between everyone working on the project.
    Director Darren Aronofsky also cleverly requested of Jared Leto and Marlon Wayans to avoid sex and sugar for a period of 30 days in order to better understand an overwhelming craving. This obviously boosts and gives their performances a more realistic edge, this is painfully, achingly real.


    The whole film has all the composites of people clinging onto hope yet ultimately spiraling downwards into their worst realizations.
    Beautifully filmed, clever uses of photography and image segments. Split screens of characters talking, drug using/tablet taking, surreal visions of TV show hosts in motion and a mutant fridge coming to life! Complete madness; the effect of pharmaceutical drugs not just illegal ones.
    During one scene in which Ellen Burstyn is hallucinating, her entire apartment is taken apart piece by piece as though it was the set of a television show. Several crewmembers of the mock television show pass Burstyn in her chair, including a man carrying a clip board with the Greek letter/mathematical symbol Pi on the back - a genius reference to Darren Aronofsky's first film.
    This movie is simply masterful work; it's mood beginning vibrant and full of life and gradually the piece becomes full of despair. Advised not for the faint of heart or audiences of a squeamish disposition.

    Requiem For A Dream teaches us to give up our false hopes, quit our obsessive habits, and to lessen our need for drugs, before its too late to do so. Watching this film will put you off drugs for life and rightly so. A film that is so fast paced it makes your heart race, so cringe worthy, so real; an emotional pounder of synaptic shocking proportions.
    Adapted from the book by Hubert Selby Jr. whom also worked on the screenplay, Requiem for a Dream definitely makes me want to go and find this book immediately.
    The Music by Clint Mansell is also a blessing; wait for the revelation emotion breaking ending with the theme song playing.

    Cleverly Requiem meaning essentially death is the story of human nature and how if we let our impulses and desires control everything we do, they can ultimately destroy us. Sex is a drug, acid and narcotics are drugs, prescription pills are drugs, and the biggest drug of all; Life. Brutal, unrelenting and unafraid to take drastic measures to get across it's messages. This is a truthful vision of life and death; of ourselves and the biggest dream of all, is our lives.
  • December 16, 2009
    Jared Leto stars as a junkie looking for a way onto easy street for himself, his bored upper class girlfriend Jennifer Connelly and partner in crime Marlon Wyans. It's easy to dismiss Requiem For A Dream as a simplistic "drugs are bad" fable, but if you watch it with unbiased eye...( read more)s, it actually is not preachy at all. It is a beautifully shot, visually inventive and extremely well acted tale documenting the modern world's obsession with the quick fix; every character in their own way is dealing with their empty, meaningless lives by avoiding dealing with them with the use of various addicitons; whether it be heroin, chocolate or television which inevitably leads to an unending spiral of degradation. After all, if you spend all of your time avoiding your problems, when they finally catch up with you they will inevitably be infinitely worse. Making Trainspotting look like The Little Mermaid, it's a harrowing, grimly affecting yet hypnotic film that you can feel gnawing at you in the pit of your stomach. This is cinema as an artform, and the best film David Lynch never made.
  • September 4, 2009
    Capitalism has lead to consumerism and consumerism has lead to addiction. We are now all drug addicts and greed is the drug and we must have it at any cost. Hard hitting social commentary from Aronofsky who goes from strength to strength.
  • August 10, 2009
    If the stunning script -- particularly the clever dialog -- doesn't drive you up the wall, then the brilliantly coached dialect may step up and drive you to drink. A nightmare not to be endured.
  • February 9, 2010
    WHAT A RIDE!!! i LOOKED AT JENNIFER CONNELLY THE SAME AGAIN...LOL
  • February 1, 2010
    The theme song is beautiful and the movie is really good.
  • January 30, 2010
    A funny, gross, sad, & hysterical movie, all at once! At times I found it difficult to watch bc I had come to identify with, & be repulsed by, the characters, their dilemmas & their choices.

    ...LOL, eww, ...shit,... lmao, throughout the entire movie!
  • January 26, 2010
    loved this movie! so sad
  • January 26, 2010
    Haunting, beautiful, disturbing, powerful, depressing.

Critic Reviews


May 8, 2001
Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

[It] may be a bummer to some audiences, so harsh is its view of the drug culture. But no one interested in the power and magic of movies should miss it. full review

January 1, 2000
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

Aronofsky brings a new urgency to the drug movie by trying to reproduce, through his subjective camera, how his characters feel, or want to feel, or fear to feel. full review

View more Requiem for a Dream reviews at RottenTomatoes.com

Comments


  • tghtkid26
    April 14, 2009
    this movie is so real and it depicts real people and real problems in our society. i really strongly feel a connection with this movie becuz it has alot of stuff that i have seen people deal with within my lifetime. it also shows that anyone can get addicted to harmful drugs. and that its not always on purpose. people should show more caution to who they trust and it might not always be the right person that is your friend. but a person needs to think how that person really affects u and if life might just be better without them.
  • ember22
    March 29, 2009
    Psh... will every1 stop the, "I'm never going to do drugs now, not that I ever would before" bullshit. When will people learn that "drugs" all do different things, have different risks and not all are addictive. Yes this film should put you off doing certain types of drugs such as smack, and yes you can become dependant on some weight loss pills, which are genrally illegal. Do you homework on drugs as individual substances and dont take the view that all illegal substances are life threatening, addictive and therefore highly dangerious.

    Ok... rant over.
  • MorpheusOne
    February 8, 2009
    A funny, gross, sad, & hysterical movie, all at once! At times I found it difficult to watch bc I had come to identify with, & be repulsed by, the characters, their dilemmas & their choices. LOL, eww, ...shit,... lmao, throughout the entire movie!

    Kids in highschool should be forced to watch this movie!!
  • Number1MovieFan
    November 1, 2008
    Fantastic movie but sad ending.5 Stars and Fav.
  • VanessaOliveira
    July 15, 2008
    ohhhh...
    i didnt saw yet this movie with Jared =( ...
    hope see soon..
    im very courious
  • giligor
    August 1, 2007
    this movie is just...OK, i'm speechless... after watching this movie i could'nt speak for a few minutes.. it just shocked me.. and the cast..wow.. they were amazing!..
  • TheSlowJoker
    June 30, 2007
    im deffinatley not gonna do drugs ever but was anyone else rather shocked at the scene were marion was doing sexual activities as a gambling thing just to get money for a fix
  • spastictoad
    June 27, 2007
    a damn good movie, great editing, one of my favorites but didnt influence me in the slightest on the whole drug use prevention front. thats a choice you have to make and if your gonna watch this film just to convince yourself not to try drugs then dont watch it. thats not the point of this movie. this movie is a peephole into the lives of people who are victims of circumstance, lacking the will power to overcome said circumstance and consequently attaining their just rewards. watch it because its edgy and because it is a masterpiece of modern cinema not because you think its an anti-drug propoganda campaign.
  • ailiesavestheday
    June 23, 2007
    If u ever think about starting drug use.....watch this....see if u feel the sm after the film. i doubt it.
  • enwooten278
    June 12, 2007
    This has to be one of my favorite movies of all time. It is so real and something everyone should see before they die. Everything about Requiem for a Dream is amazing from the acting to the soundtrack to the direction, I love it. It is one of those movies that you see once and can't stop thinking about.

Critic ratings and reviews powered by RottenTomatoes.com

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Requiem for a Dream Trivia


  • In what movie did Jared Leto play a drug addict/dealer?  Answer »
  • In what movie are the character(s) working to get a "pound of pure"?  Answer »
  • what does harold take form his mother, for drugs?¿ in the movie Requiem For a Dream  Answer »
  • In which movie does Ellen Burstyn play a woman obsessed about fitting into a red dress?  Answer »

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