Black Swan, the Academy Award-winning thriller directed by Darren Aronofsky and starring Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis, is popping 15 years in 2025, and we’re nonetheless unpacking the mind-bending thriller a couple of ballet dancer spiraling into insanity. Aronofsky’s movie stays as cryptic as ever, and greater than a decade later, the director finds himself answering questions on it. One among them regards the traditional rumor that he tried to create spite between Portman and Kunis as a result of they had been rivals within the movie. Because it seems, that is a type of filmmaking rumors that has some fact to it.
The trio not too long ago sat down with Vogue with the intention to have fun the legacy of the movie. The five-time Academy Award-nominated launch was an enormous hit on the field workplace, grossing greater than $329 million from a $13 million manufacturing funds. Though time has handed, Aronofksy and co-stars Portman and Kunis nonetheless appear to vividly bear in mind the manufacturing, the issues they discovered, and a few of the setbacks. Aronofsky was requested about making an attempt to “pit” the 2 actors in opposition to one another, and his reply was… curious.
Aronofsky admitted that he tried to generate some friction between the co-stars: “My take is that I used to be making an attempt to be a sneaky director and make them argue. Mila and Natalie each realized in a short time what I used to be doing and made enjoyable of me, so it shortly grew to become a joke that all of us understood. They’re each very intelligent and had been immediately aware about no matter trick I used to be taking part in.”
Portman, then again, stated she was simply pleased with her pal realistically taking part in a superb ballet dancer: “I bear in mind being separated from Mila and that we weren’t in the identical house rather a lot after we weren’t capturing. Darren made some remark early on, like, ‘Ya know, Nat, Mila’s dancing so effectively.’ And I used to be like, ‘After all she is! She’s so f-ing proficient, and I really like her a lot, and I am pleased she’s doing an awesome job!'”
Kunis agreed with Portman, and revealed that they knew the director was as much as one thing with the unusual gossiping: “Darren would inform me, ‘Nat is working actually, actually arduous. She’s not even taking Saturdays and Sundays off.’ Then I might textual content Nat, and he or she’d be like, ‘No, I am not?’ I believe that is how we discovered what Darren was as much as, however it was all in good enjoyable.”
Fifteen Years Later, Natalie Portman Reveals Which Scene Was the Hardest to Shoot
It is Precisely the One You’re Considering Of
There is a robust argument for the idea that Black Swan stays Portman’s most formidable efficiency so far. Not solely did the actor must undergo intensive ballet coaching, however she performed a sophisticated character with a shattered mindset. It could all work out in the long run, with Black Swan incomes her an Oscar for Greatest Actress (a uncommon feat contemplating the movie’s tinges of horror, a style the Academy has hardly ever honored). It will need to have been a difficult manufacturing, though the actor’s choice for essentially the most tough scene wasn’t one of many ballet set items. It was the one the place she needed to get intimate along with her pal:
“The one scene that was fairly arduous to shoot was when Mila and I attached. I discovered that it is enjoyable to work along with your pal till you must movie a intercourse scene with them. I bear in mind Darren being like, ‘You guys solely must do it as soon as, and you will not must do it once more.’
“We had been each standing within the room like [heavy, nervous breathing] till Darren yelled, ‘Motion,’ and we simply went for it. And he stored his phrase, we went for it, and we did not must do any of it greater than as soon as. However that was positively the one scene the place I bear in mind attending to set and pondering, ‘I do not be ok with this.'”
Kunis, then again, did not appear to recollect a lot about doing the scene, and stated she blocked it out of her reminiscence: “To inform you the reality, I utterly forgot about that scene [laughs]. I used to be simply shortly pondering by way of the film like, ‘Hmm, what was arduous?’ I completely blocked that out.”
Black Swan
- Launch Date
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December 3, 2010
- Runtime
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108 minutes
