Black Swan is a 2010 American psychological horror thriller film directed by Darren Aronofsky, from a screenplay by Mark Heyman, John McLaughlin, and Andres Heinz, and based on a story by Heinz. Starring Natalie Portman, Vincent Cassel, Mila Kunis, Barbara Hershey, and Winona Ryder, the film follows a production of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake by the company of New York City Ballet, led by Artistic Director Thomas Leroy (Cassel). The production requires a ballerina to play the innocent and fragile White Swan, for which the committed dancer Nina Sayers (Portman) is a perfect fit, as well as the dark and sensual Black Swan, which are qualities better embodied by the new rival Lily (Kunis). Nina is overwhelmed by immense pressure when she finds herself competing for the role, causing her to lose her tenuous grip on reality and descend into madness.
Aronofsky conceived the premise by connecting his viewings of a production of Swan Lake with an unrealized screenplay about understudies and the notion of being haunted by a double, similar to the folklore surrounding doppelgängers. Aronofsky cites Fyodor Dostoevsky's The Double as another inspiration for the film. Aronofsky also considered Black Swan a companion piece to his film The Wrestler (2008), with both films revolving around demanding performances for different kinds of art. He and Portman first discussed the project in 2000, and after a brief attachment to Universal Pictures, Black Swan was produced in New York City in late 2009 by Fox Searchlight Pictures. Portman and Kunis trained in ballet for several months prior to filming.
Black Swan premiered at the 67th Venice International Film Festival on September 1, 2010, and had a limited release in the United States starting on December 3, before opening in wide release on December 17. Upon release, the film received widespread acclaim from critics, with praise toward Aronofsky's direction and the performances of Portman, Kunis, and Hershey. It also emerged as a major commercial success at the box office, grossing $332.1 million worldwide on a $13 million budget. The film received five nominations at the 83rd Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director for Aronofsky, with Portman winning Best Actress; it also received four nominations at the 68th Golden Globe Awards, including Best Motion Picture – Drama and Best Director for Aronofsky, with Portman winning Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama. In 2021, Portman's performance was included in The New Yorkers list of the best film performances of the 21st century.
Plot Nina Sayers, a young dancer with the New York City Ballet, lives with her overprotective mother, Erica, a former ballerina. The company is opening the season with Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake. After forcing the current , Beth, into retirement, artistic director Thomas Leroy announces he is looking for a new dancer for the dual roles of the innocent and fragile White Swan, Odette, and the sensual and dark Black Swan, Odile. Nina auditions and gives a flawless performance as Odette, but fails to embody Odile, causing Thomas to dismiss her.
The next day, Nina asks Thomas to reconsider. He forcibly kisses her and she bites him and runs out of his office. Later, Nina is surprised to find she has received the lead role. At a gala celebrating the new season, an intoxicated Beth publicly accuses Nina of providing sexual favors to Thomas in return for the role. The next day, Nina hears Beth has been hit by a car; Thomas believes she was attempting suicide. Nina visits Beth in the hospital and is distraught to see her injured legs; it is clear she will never dance again.
During rehearsals, Thomas tells Nina to observe a newcomer, Lily, who has a physical resemblance to Nina but also an uninhibited quality Nina lacks. Nina has hallucinations and finds scratch marks on her back. One night, despite her mom Erica's objections, Nina accepts Lily's invitation to go out for drinks. Lily offers Nina an ecstasy capsule, which Nina rejects. Lily pours the ecstasy capsule into Nina's drink. While intoxicated, Nina flirts with men at the bar and with Lily as well. After the two dance very close to each other at a nightclub, they go back to Nina's apartment in a cab, where Lily fingers Nina in the backseat. When they arrive at the apartment, Nina has a heated argument with Erica. She and Lily barricade themselves in Nina's room and start passionately kissing. Lily performs oral sex on Nina, who starts having hallucinations again. The next morning, Nina wakes up disoriented and alone and realizes that she is late for rehearsal.
At rehearsal, Nina sees Lily dancing as Odile and confronts her about their sexual encounter. Lily denies that it happened and teases Nina for fantasizing about her. Heartbroken, Nina becomes convinced Lily intends to replace her, especially after learning that Thomas has made Lily her alternate. Nina's mysterious injuries and hallucinations grow more severe, leading to an incident where she believes she is transforming into Odile. Erica grows concerned about her well-being and attempts to prevent Nina from performing on opening night.
After a physical confrontation with her mother and a confrontation with Beth, Nina arrives at the theater, where she finds Lily preparing to take the stage as Odette because Nina has been absent. Nina convinces Thomas to allow her to take back her role. Towards the end of the ballet's second act, Nina is distracted by a hallucination and loses her balance during a lift, causing Prince Siegfried to drop her, infuriating Thomas. Nina returns to her dressing room and finds Lily preparing to play Odile. She confronts her and Lily appears to transform into a doppelgänger copy of Nina. The two fight, breaking a mirror. Nina stabs her doppelgänger with a shard of glass, killing her and breaking the illusion. Nina hides Lily's body and takes the stage. She dances flawlessly as Odile and seemingly begins to turn into a black swan, her arms covered in feathers. Amidst a standing ovation from the audience, Nina surprises Thomas with a passionate kiss.
In her dressing room, Nina resumes the Odette tutu and white swan makeup, but is interrupted by Lily, who congratulates Nina for her performance. Nina sees the mirror is still broken, but all other evidence of the stabbing is gone, including the body. She looks down and pulls a piece of glass from her abdomen, realizing she stabbed herself and not Lily. Despite her injury, she dances the final act of the ballet with blood gradually seeping through her costume. The show ends with her jumping from the set onto a hidden mattress to simulate Odette throwing herself off a cliff. Everyone erupts in thunderous applause while Thomas, Lily, and the other dancers gather to congratulate Nina backstage. Thomas eventually realizes Nina is bleeding and shouts for help, asking Nina what happened. Nina calmly replies: "I felt it. Perfect. I was perfect", as the screen fades to white.
Cast During the closing credits, the major cast members are credited both as their film characters as well as their corresponding characters from Swan Lake. Natalie Portman as Nina Sayers/White Swan/Black Swan, a ballerina for the NYC ballet who strives for perfection while struggling with stress and various traumatic issues Mila Kunis as Lily, an experienced ballerina transferred to the company and seen as a threat to Nina Vincent Cassel as Thomas Leroy/The Gentleman, the sexual crazed Artistic Director Barbara Hershey as Erica Sayers/The Queen, Nina's overprotective mother and a retired ballerina Winona Ryder as Elizabeth "Beth" MacIntyre/The Dying Swan, a star prima ballerina who was forced into retirement Benjamin Millepied as David Moreau/Prince Siegfried, Nina's dance partner Ksenia Solo as Veronica/Little Swan, a ballerina who was originally Thomas's first pick for the lead in Swan Lake Kristina Anapau as Galina/Little Swan Janet Montgomery as Madeline/Little Swan Sebastian Stan as Andrew/Suitor Toby Hemingway as Tom/Suitor Sergio Torrado as Sergio/Von Rothbart Mark Margolis as Mr. Fithian/Patron Tina Sloan as Mrs. Fithian/Patron
Production Conception Darren Aronofsky first became interested in ballet when his sister studied dance at the High School of Performing Arts in New York City. The basic idea for the film started when he hired screenwriters to rework a screenplay called The Understudy, which portrayed off-Broadway actors and explored the notion of being haunted by a double. Aronofsky said the screenplay had elements of All About Eve (1950), Roman Polanski's The Tenant (1976), and Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novella The Double. The director had also seen numerous productions of Swan Lake, and he connected the duality of the White Swan and the Black Swan to the script. When researching for the production of Black Swan, Aronofsky found ballet to be "a very insular world" whose dancers were "not impressed by movies". Regardless, the director found active and inactive dancers to share their experiences with him.
He also stood backstage to see the Bolshoi Ballet perform at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.
Aronofsky called Black Swan a companion piece to his previous film The Wrestler, recalling one of his early projects about a love affair between a wrestler and a ballerina. He eventually separated the wrestling and the ballet worlds as "too much for one movie". He compared the two films: "Wrestling some consider the lowest art—if they would even call it art—and ballet some people consider the highest art. But what was amazing to me was how similar the performers in both of these worlds are. They both make incredible use of their bodies to express themselves." About the psychological thriller nature of Black Swan, actress Natalie Portman compared the film's tone to Polanski's 1968 film Rosemary's Baby, while Aronofsky said Polanski's Repulsion (1965) and The Tenant (1976) were "big influences" on the final film. Actor Vincent Cassel also compared Black Swan to Polanski's early works and additionally compared it to David Cronenberg's early works.
Casting
Aronofsky first discussed with Natalie Portman the possibility of a ballet film in 2000, and he found she was interested in playing a ballet dancer. Portman explained being part of Black Swan, "I'm trying to find roles that demand more adulthood from me because you can get stuck in a very awful cute cycle as a woman in film, especially being such a small person." Portman suggested to Aronofsky that her good friend Mila Kunis would be perfect for the role. Kunis contrasted Lily with Nina, "My character is very loose ... She's not as technically good as Natalie's character, but she has more passion, naturally. That's what [Nina] lacks." The female characters are directed in the Swan Lake production by Thomas Leroy, played by Cassel. He compared his character to George Balanchine, who co-founded New York City Ballet and was "a control freak, a true artist using sexuality to direct his dancers".