Donnie Darko (2001)

A bizarre and cherished teenage relic for those who grew up feeling misunderstood.

Directed by: Richard Kelly

Cinematography by: Steven Poster

Country: United States

Genre: Drama/Mystery/Sci-Fi/Thriller/Romance

If “emo” was a movie genre, Donnie Darko would rightly fall under that banner. Super angsty, and made (makes?) high school kids feel edgy because “Donnie Darko gets it man, he thinks about death and hates authority and stuff.” It may sound like I’m slamming the movie, but I’m absolutely not; as a high schooler and early college-r whose favorite t-shirt color was black and whose favorite band was Bullet for My Valentine, I was said angsty, edgy-feeling-without-actually-being-edgy teenager who beheld Donnie Darko as the holy grail.

Re-watching it 7-8 years later, I was mostly struck by how utterly bizarre it is. You could throw any number of genre categories at it, but none really feel like they stick: it’s just Donnie Darko. It’s a movie about a troubled, chronically sleepwalking high school kid, who may or may not have paranoid schizophrenia, who takes an interest in time travel after he starts seeing luminescent blobs seep out of people’s chests and a scary rabbit named Frank tells him that the world is going to end in 28 days.

There’s also a very endearing love story. And Sparkle Motion. And Patrick Swayze as a creepy, cult-y motivational speaker. And a Drew Barrymore storyline that doesn’t really go anywhere. And Sparkle Motion. And Seth Rogen is an asshole. And there’s some social commentary about 80s Reagan Era values. And that song about “familiar faces, worn out places, worn out faaaaaces.” And did I mention Sparkle Motion?

It’s completely in a lane of its own, and the most amazing part is that through all the unadulterated kookiness, writer/director Richard Kelly makes viewers genuinely care about the characters. That’s filmmaking. And if you were an angsty, brooding teenager like myself, it made you feel understood, it made you feel like you belonged. That’s art. It unites people, it makes you feel like you have a place.

Distributed by: Arrow Films / Newmarket Films / 20th Century Fox