Donnie Darko - Page 2

It's not that bad a movie (I would say it's rather good), but it is the sort of movie that seems to attract hordes of Try Hards and Thinkalikes. And people who think the movie has some mindfuck deepness that just isn't there.

i was lucky enough to meet the director, prior to seeing this film, as being in Richmond,Virginia it got a second release for about a week in spring 2002, I had not seen the film yet, and wanted to but sat through his explanation which was more indepth than the DVD commentary and shows how love he put into this film. I love directors like this and I can't wait to see what he does next. Donnie Darko was really personal for him and it hit a lot of personal notes for me. Kinda a sorry it would take me a whole 4 months before actually seeing this great film. Which I was able to understand first time, for the most part.

I just saw this last night and this is the only thing I didn't quite get.

Any help?

Last try, I'll give up after this.

(quote)
5) The Manipulated Dead

Someone who dies in the Tangent Universe. They are able to contact the Living Receiver. They are more powerful than the Manipulated Living.

Often the Manipulated Dead will set an Ensurance Trap for the Living Receiver, to ensure the artifact is returned to the Primary Universe.

Frank is the Manipulated Dead, and the things he makes Donnie do are his Ensurance Trap.
(quote)

Well, to build on that, Frank makes him do those things to set certain events in motion.

If Donnie hadn't flooded the school, he wouldn't have had the chance to save Gretchen from the bullies and talk to her (although this seems a bit weak to me, as they had a class together, she'd already obviously noticed him, and they would have met eventually).

If Donnie hadn't burned down Jim Cunningham's house, the child pornography wouldn't have been discovered, Jim wouldn't have gone to jail, that teacher whose name I can't remember wouldn't have needed to be at his trial, and Donnie's mom wouldn't have gone with Sparkle Motion on that plane.

Now, why it had to be Donnie's mom on the plane, I don't know (I may be forgetting a detail -- I remember she calls the house from the airport but I don't remember why), but in general Frank is just making Donnie set very specific events in motion.

Sorry -- what I meant was, why is it important, in the larger scheme of things, that Mrs. Darko be on that plane? Why could the pocket universe only come to an end if it were HER chaperoning, and not the teacher or anyone else?

In other words, Frank has Donnie do things that lead to Mrs. Darko being on the plane. Why is this particular arrangement of people crucial to what Frank and Donnie are doing?

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Because they could only have the party if the mom wasn't in the house. The party makes Frank go buy beer and run into Gretchen which in turn convinces Donnie to roll back the clock. If the mom didn't go on the plane the party would have never happened, therefore, never sets those specific events into place. Hope that clears it up.

Christ, the party! I am D-U-M dumb. Thanks.

Thanks, that all helped out a great deal. I'm still a little unsure about the water in the school but at least I have something to work with now.

Amen. Couldn't have said it better myself. In fact, I tried, and I really couldn't.

great discussion. I was blown away when I saw it for the first time and love it every time i see it. But never watch it on HBO-you need the widescreen. I saw it on HBO and it sucked for me because I know what was missing.
Any film that actually causes indepth thought can't be that bad. I can't wait till this director makes another film.

Finally saw this last night. Quite an interesting movie. The responses here in this thread helped clear some things up. I really dug the soundtrack, I'll have to go look for it now.

I do have my own question though. The scene that starts with Donnie coming out of the back of the bus is a great montage. In the commentary, Jake comments that this is a sequence that director had worked on for a long time. I also think I remember seeing something about it on IFC or the Sundance channel. Can someone pop in and tell me the significance of the sequence? I loved the shots and the mix with the song, but I think there is something underneath that I am missing.

Wow how did I miss this post.. I know it's sort of late, but, what a stinking, open-asshole of a comment to make. Thanks for despising me and other fans of this film. BY the way, fuck you very much you tasteless hipster sonofabitch.

There there- all better!

uh yeah

Anyways watched this for the 2nd time a few weeks back and it improved quite a bit I thought. Still a very cool flick.

This movie fucked with my head. By the end of it I felt like I understood it perfectly but couldn't put it into words. It took me two days to really get it. Donnie's sacrifice at the end was so beautiful, I almost cried. The incredible creepiness of Frank really helps the movie along too. Oh, and I think this is one of those movies that should only be watched sober.

I'm coming late to this discussion, but what the hey.

I think it's fine for the creators of the movie to have all this "science" to back up their story, but it shouldn't be necessary to seek it out to enjoy the movie.

And for me, I loved it without knowing all the extra stuff.

In fact, some of the facts relayed in the commmentary annoyed me. The director took away the ambiguity and went right for the time travel explanation. For most of the movie, I wasn't sure if Donnie was going crazy or if parallel universes were really converging on him. And I liked that. I thought his Frank visions were downright scary. Frank could tell him to do things, and Jake looked pretty psychotic in those trances.

The big annoyance I had concerned Frank's identity:
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SPOILER
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The director talked about Frank being the sister's boyfriend like we should be able to pick up on that by watching the film. Yes, the pieces fit, but if we were supposed to know that it should have been made more obvious. It's an enjoyable movie without that piece of information, but don't take it for granted that people would figure that out.
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I'd also like to mention that Donnie Darko is playing at Rochester's George Eastman House this Saturday at 8 PM, if anyone nearby wants to see it on the big screen.

<a href="http://eastman.org/calendar/calendar.htm" target="_blank">http://eastman.org/calendar/calendar.htm</a>

I'd have to watch it again to be sure, but I don't remember her saying boyfriend. I know someone aske where Frank had gone, and the note on the fridge said he'd gone to get beer. I just assumed he was a guy at the party.

On the commentary, they say he was the one talking to her on the phone once or twice. And he was the one who dropped her off just before the jet engine crashed. The honking horn was not a "good bye" to the sister, but a "wake up" to Donnie.

It's like there's a whole other movie going on beyond the range of the audience's understanding. Which is kind of interesting, but I felt a little cheated upon hearing details like this. I don't necessarilly want all the sci-fi ideas spelled out for me, but the boyfriend info would have been nice to know.

Just finished this up about 30 minutes ago. Now, it was beautifully shot, and the score was good, and story was... interesting, but I have to admit that I don't have a freaking clue what just happened. I picked up none of this tangent universe stuff from the movie, none of the Manipulated Dead and Manipulated Living stuff, and had no idea that Donnie had any powers beyond the ability to see the paths of people ahead of time. Maybe I'm just stupid, but I read this thread and the earlier one, and I feel like I watched a totally different movie than everyone else. So.. I'm watching it again tomorrow, to see if I can figure it out this time around.

Also, interestingly (especially in the context of the rest of the movie's events), the moment after Frank said "The world will end" at the beginning of the movie, I saw a bright streak of light in the sky outside my window. Probably just a shooting star, but still, kind of creepy...

Ok, I posted this in the new thread but it has been closed, so here is my theory:

Here's my long, convulted theory, doubt it's what the director thinks, but I like it.

Donnie didn't really enjoy life, in fact, it was pretty miserable, he wakes up in these wierd places, he has to take pills to stop some unknown thing, he fights constantly with his family, and all in all, just not very memorable. So then the engine happens from a parallell universe, this disrupts everything. Donnie should have died, he was supposed to, but Frank, who is controlled by a greater power, calls Donnie out, and saves him.

Now everyone is being used by the greater power (God if you believe in him) to steer Donnie back into getting killed by the engine. But think about what happens, he meets Gretchen, they fall in love, he starts to get along with his family, and Frank gives him a purpose. Now, I don't know when this happens, but Donnie realizes everything that he has to do, but only in his subconsious mind. Kind of like a dream you had that you can't remember, yet you can recall the jist of it. When he's not in his dream state, he is slowly guided by the people arounded and by is mind. When he is in his dream state, he sees Frank, time warps, the future, everything. But still, when he's awake, he's trying to find out what he is supposed to be doing. Now after all the events line up, Gretchen dies, which gives Donnie the choice to save Gretchen and die, or destroy the world.

Now here's how I see it: Donnie had to die, but God didn't want him to die in the state he was in, so he created the parallel universe for two weeks. Donnie wasn't ready to die yet, but when your given a choice to sacrifice yourself for your love and well, the world, or just die without even knowing it, you're more likely to want to have the choice, it makes you prepared and ready, like when Donnie is laughing right before the engine falls, he has seen God, and he's not afraid to die because he made that choice. Responsibility saved Donnie.

If you recall Donnie and Gretchen make that invention to give babies good memories, well, basically, that is what God did to Donnie and what Donnie was doing for Gretchen, except instead of giving good memories, he erased the bad ones for her. There may have also been a second agenda that was slipped in there, when everyone wakes up the next day, Jim Cunningham is crying because he has this horrible nightmare of people finding the truth about him, maybe, he'll stop, or at least be warned. Cherita, has this dream of her love telling her that everything will be ok. She wakes up smiling, the first time you ever see her doing that. So God did the memory thing with them too.

It is kind of sad when you realize that the last words Donnie utters is "Bitch" to his mom. And that no one realizes what Donnie did for them. And how knows, this kind of thing might happen when every person dies, we just wouldn't know about it, but God may make them all "ready" first.

Great movie, I really like how the director creates suspense even though it was set in the 80's, which everyone obviously survived. There's a lot more to explain, if you like this theory, or have any more questions, please ask, I probably left a lot out.

That sounds pretty air tight, and I think holds pretty close to what Richard Kelly was going for.

So the whole story is kind of like that Murakami story, Super Frog Saves Tokyo.

I wouldn't worry about it. It's one of my favorite movies, but I still think the director did a crappy job getting across his ideas in it. Like Donnie's control over fire. First, why would he have this power? Second, does the arson scene really suggest anything aside from a normal fire? And his super strength -- what's the point of having it if he's just going to put an axe in the head of the mascot? Wouldn't it have come in a lot more handy at the end when the bully is holding him down? I think it's a very good movie, but it's not the one the director seems to think he's made.

After finally watching this movie, i felt it had a lot of Christian beliefs interlaced. Did anyone else?

http://metaphilm.com/philm.php?id=10_0_2_0

Also, I oculdn't help but thiking of the Butterfly Effect.

That does not compute.