Subtlety of Meaning vs. Extended Metaphors

I saw Black Swan recently, which is a supernatural pseudo-thriller set in the world of ballet with lesbians overtones. Which, yeah, is a mouthful as far as genres go. Darren Aronofsky, the director of Swan, previously knocked out movies like The Fountain, Requiem for a Dream, and Pi. So the man's pretty familiar with every subsection of that aforementioned genre, except maybe ballet.

I loved Black Swan. Natalie Portman's performance was out-of-her-mind good. If you ever watch sports, they like to use the term "in the zone" to describe a fantastic sports performer playing at a near-perfect level. I'm a Packers fan, and the perfect descriptor of "in the zone" for a sports performer was Aaron Rodgers in the Atlanta Falcons game. Natalie Portman in Black Swan was the cinematic equivalent. She's always been an excellent actress, but Black Swan was so far beyond anything she's done previously that it was like seeing her for the first time.

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