Darron Aronofsky and His Films
Once upon a time in America, people endured pain and adjusted to the changing moods that mark human nature without an endless variety of pharmaceuticals served up by drug companies. Popular musicians performed without snorting cocaine and shooting heroin. Teens partied without smoking pot. College students drank without bingeing from Thursday night until Monday morning. Upper East Side rich kids, Beverly Hills brats, and gays socialized without club drugs. Tobacco didn’t kill 450,000 people and make another 8.6 million people seriously ill each year. Crack cocaine didn’t turn poor urban neighborhoods into killing fields. Rural garages weren’t moonlighting as manufacturing plants for crystal meth. Athletes performed without bulking up on steroids. Young women kept their weight down without smoking. Most all of us stayed awake without amphetamines and got to sleep without sedatives. Rambunctious children were disciplined, not drugged, into correct behavior. (Califano 9)
Introduction The use of medications and drugs of all kinds have been controversial in America since the very beginning of the country’s emergence. And this controversy does not just deal with illegal drugs, although that is a huge part of it, it also deals with legal drugs, the ones the government deems safe for everyone to use. People approach the issue from all sides of the spectrum including people who think it is the best thing that has happened to America since its existence to those who think all our medical advances is what is demoralizing to our society and everything in between. The director Darren Aronofsky, who is famous for renowned films such as Requiem for a Dream and Black Swan, also fits on this spectrum, although not somewhere in the middle. In this paper, I argue that although Aronofsky’s films may have several themes intricately woven throughout, one reoccurring theme is his anti-drug and anti-medicine standpoint. A few critics claim that his movies are not
Introduction The use of medications and drugs of all kinds have been controversial in America since the very beginning of the country’s emergence. And this controversy does not just deal with illegal drugs, although that is a huge part of it, it also deals with legal drugs, the ones the government deems safe for everyone to use. People approach the issue from all sides of the spectrum including people who think it is the best thing that has happened to America since its existence to those who think all our medical advances is what is demoralizing to our society and everything in between. The director Darren Aronofsky, who is famous for renowned films such as Requiem for a Dream and Black Swan, also fits on this spectrum, although not somewhere in the middle. In this paper, I argue that although Aronofsky’s films may have several themes intricately woven throughout, one reoccurring theme is his anti-drug and anti-medicine standpoint. A few critics claim that his movies are not
Cited: Califano, Joseph A. High Society: How Substance Abuse Ravages America and What to do About It. 1st Ed. New York: Public Affairs, 2007. Print. Dodgen, Charles E., and W. Michael Shea. Substance Use Disorders: Assessment and Treatment. London: Academic Press, 2000. Print. Espejo, Roman. Drug Abuse: Current Controversies. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2002. Print. Mottram, David R. Drugs in Sport. 4th Edition. New York: Routledge, 2005. Print. Walsh, Keri. “Why Does Mickey Rourke Give Pleasure?” JSTOR 37.1 (2010): 131. Web. 24 April 2011. <http://www.jstor.org/pss/10.1086/656471?searchUrl=%2Faction%FdoBasicSearch%3F Query%3Ddarren%2Baronofsky%26acc%3Doff%26wc%3Don&Search=yes>.