Requiem for a Dream (2000) is a movie directed by Darren Aronofsky about the different types of addiction and how each have the ability to cause a lot of harm. While Harry and Marion are key characters in the film, I feel the worst for Sara Goldfarb, Harry’s mother. To me, it seemed like she had no idea what she was getting into and it all just got out of control.
Sara Goldfarb is an old, lonely woman who only wants to feel important and loved again. She lives by herself and hardly ever gets visits from her son Harry. She is normal, sane, and average. One day she gets a phone call from the infomercial that she loves to watch saying that she could be on the show. Of course thinking this could be her big break, she gets very excited and starts devoting all her time and effort to this potential show. She becomes obsessed with fitting into her old beloved red dress, and begins to take uppers which she believes are diet pills. She starts seeing results, so she takes more and more until she starts hallucinating and becoming addicted.
This is where she starts suffering from delusions. Her hair is all frazzled and gray. The background starts to become dark and bleak. The refrigerator begins to attack her, as she was afraid to eat. She becomes scared. Then she is thirsted into the bright, over-whelming world of the TV station she has made up. All the people look like monsters and they all scare her. She becomes crazy and gets sent to the hospital. The background there is gray and sad. The doctor’s efforts do not help and she is sent to a mental asylum to live out her life pretending she is the star of her favorite show.
To her, the television show is where everything is perfect for her. Harry is there and he is going to get married. She is good looking and happy. She is not alone, and she is loved. It is no wonder once all of this trauma happens, she finds an escape here. She is no longer in the real world where she is morose. She is happy, the star of her own little world. She does not know this is sad, however, the audience and her friends know. We know it’s sad because she was the innocent Sara Goldfarb who did not seem like she would hurt anyone. She did not deserve anything close to this kind of anguish. Her obsession was unhealthy, and this led her down a path she can never come back from.
American Cinema: 1960-Present 