At the beginning of the movie, Thomas tells Nina
that she doesn’t have it in her to play both the white and black swan. Her
fragility and innocence render her the perfect fit for the white swan, but she
lacks the passion and sensuality needed to play the black swan. Thomas tells
Nina to lose herself, and directs her attention to Lily. “I just want to be
perfect,” Nina says, to which Thomas responds, “Perfection isn’t just about
control.”
If one thing’s for sure, it’s that Nina heeds
Thomas’ advice. Throughout “Black Swan,” we see Nina lose herself to the point
of no return. It also becomes pretty evident midway through the movie that Nina
does in fact have the divided consciousness that the role of the Swan Queen
necessitates.
Nina begins to see her alter ego everywhere: in
the subway, in the mirror, in Lily… etc. These visions share much in common
with the passive and active roles of the black and white heroines of “Swan
Lake.”
As a dancer, Nina spends a large part of her time
looking in the mirror. It is in this mirror that she sees both the ideal and
flawed versions of herself; striving for perfection requires a sort of
self-obsession, one which Nina definitely acquires.
The first thing that came to my mind when Nina
saw her first doppelganger in the street was that perhaps the director had
wanted us to see Nina as she could have been without dance. A dancer in Nina’s
position has to give up everything for dance—dance becomes of you. It was the
same with figure skating, and it was why I stopped. There comes a point where
you have to make a decision; either you can give every ounce of your being to
your art, or you choose to abandon it altogether. For me, because I am such a
perfectionist, there was no happy medium. So, I left. Nina is a perfectionist
too, so she stays, at a huge cost to herself (her sanity and eventually her
life).
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