Donnie Darko

Donnie Darko is one of the most divisive films to come out in the past fifteen years. Those who love it praise it for being a complex work of genius while the detractors slam it as being a pretentious convoluted mess. I fall more in the former category and Donnie Darko is actually one of my favorite movies. I can understand why people may not like it and feel it's overrated, mostly due to my fellow fan boys not being able to shut up about it. While I like the film quite a bit on its on merits I think it remains as one of my favorites because it represents my introduction into the weirder side of independent movies.

I first saw Donnie Darko in the summer of 2004. I had just graduated from high school and was enjoying my last summer before being thrust into college and adulthood. I was getting deeper into film and was wanted to see more obscure movies. A friend of mine told me about Donnie Darko, he hadn't seen it personally but had some friends that liked it, and it seemed like it could be interesting to watch. I saw it knowing nothing going in and it made quite the impression on my young mind (the ideal way of seeing it is knowing nothing beforehand so all you haters need to just go back in time and watch it with a clean slate). It was like nothing I'd ever seen before and had me with my jaw on the floor in awe by the end. I really wanted to make sense of this visual rubix cube and forced many of my friends to watch it just so I had someone to talk to about it. The film was so unique to me and I wanted to seek out more movies that were on the fringe. I obsessed over the movie, watching it multiple times and reading all the fan theories I could find online. Donnie Darko was my gateway movie into the world of independent cinema and marks the shift from being a regular movie fan to full fledged cinephile.

I can't say how many times I've seen Donnie Darko but every time I watch it I get fully absorbed into the film. There is a really big sense of nostalgia when I watch the movie, it takes me back to that simpler time with no responsibilities when the future was so full of promise and possibilities. I love the conflicting tones of the film. At times it feels like a traditional high school movie but then it switches into a visual nightmare that stills gives me chills. All the scenes involving Frank are extremely unsettling and add to the dreamlike atmosphere in the movie. The soundtrack is perfect, mixing 80s rock with eerie instrumentals only further adds to the dichotomy of the film which I find so fascinating. It's a coming of age story that is extremely relatable smashed into the middle of David Lynch movie. There's something about that combination that I just find irresistible.

Sometimes I wonder if I hadn't been the first of my friends to watch Donnie Darko if I'd still like it. Would the hype of the movie ruined the experience for me? Would that disappointment discourage me from exploring more independent movies and ultimately change the very essence of my being? That's a reality I'm glad I don't have to live in.

Tomorrow we go deeper into the nightmarish rabbit hole with Eraserhead...