Product Description

REQUIEM FOR A DREAM: Darren Aronofsky follows up his acclaimed debut Pi with this gritty emotionally charged film set amidst the abandoned beaches and faded glory of Coney Island, Brooklyn. Based upon the novel by celebrated author Hubert Selby Jr., the story intricately links the lives of a lonely widowed mother (Academy Award (r) Winner Ellen Burstyn*), her son Harry (Jared Leto), his beautiful girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connelly) and his best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans). REQUIEM FOR A DREAM is a hypnotic tale of four human beings each pursuing their vision of happiness. Even as everything begins to fall apart, they refuse to let go, plummeting with their dreams into a nightmarish, gut-wrenching freefall. *1975 Best Actress, Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore

PI: A brilliant mathematician teeters on the brink of insanity as he searches for an elusive numerical code in this critically acclaimed, sci-fi thriller!

Maximilian Cohen (Sean Gullette) is on the verge of the most important discovery of his life. For the past ten years, he has been attempting to decode the numerical pattern beneath the ultimate system of ordererd chaos - the stock market. As Max verges on a solution, chaos is swallowing the world around him. Pursued by an aggressive Wall Street firm set on financial dominance and a Kaballah sect intent on unlocking the secrets behind their ancient holy texts, Max races to crack the code, hoping to defy the madness that looms before him. Instead, he uncovers a seccret for which everyone is willing to kill.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #11226 in DVD
• Released on: 2002-02-26
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Black & White, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 2
• Running time: 187 minutes

Amazon.com
Requiem for a Dream
Employing shock techniques and sound design in a relentless sensory assault, Requiem for a Dream is about nothing less than the systematic destruction of hope. Based on the novel by Hubert Selby Jr., and adapted by Selby and director Darren Aronofsky, this is undoubtedly one of the most effective films ever made about the experience of drug addiction (both euphoric and nightmarish), and few would deny that Aronofsky, in following his breakthrough film Pi, has pushed the medium to a disturbing extreme, thrusting conventional narrative into a panic zone of traumatized psyches and bodies pushed to the furthest boundaries of chemical tolerance. It's too easy to call this a cautionary tale; it's a guided tour through hell, with Aronofsky as our bold and ruthless host. The film focuses on a quartet of doomed souls, but it's Ellen Burstyn--in a raw and bravely triumphant performance--who most desperately embodies the downward spiral of drug abuse. As lonely widow Sara Goldfarb, she invests all of her dreams in an absurd self-help TV game show, jolting her bloodstream with diet pills and coffee while her son Harry (Jared Leto) shoots heroin with his best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans) and slumming girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connelly). They're careening toward madness at varying speeds, and Aronofsky tracks this gloomy process by endlessly repeating the imagery of their deadly routines. Tormented by her dietary regime, Sara even imagines a carnivorous refrigerator in one of the film's most memorable scenes. And yet... does any of this have a point? Is Aronofsky telling us anything that any sane person doesn't already know? Requiem for a Dream is a noteworthy film, but watching it twice would qualify as masochistic behavior. --Jeff Shannon

Pi
Patterns exist everywhere: in nature, in science, in religion, in business. Max Cohen (played hauntingly by Sean Gullette) is a mathematician searching for these patterns in everything. Yet, he's not the only one, and everyone from Wall Street investors, looking to break the market, to Hasidic Jews, searching for the 216-digit number that reveals the true name of God, are trying to get their hands on Max. This dark, low-budget film was shot in black and white by director Darren Aronofsky. With eerie music, voice-overs, and overt symbolism enhancing the somber mood, Aronofsky has created a disturbing look at the world. Max is deeply paranoid, holed up in his apartment with his computer Euclid, obsessively studying chaos theory. Blinding headaches and hallucinogenic visions only feed his paranoia as he attempts to remain aloof from the world, venturing out only to meet his mentor, Sol Robeson (Mark Margolis), who for some mysterious reason feels Max should take a break from his research. This movie is complex--occasionally too complex--but the psychological drama and the loose sci-fi elements make this a worthwhile, albeit consuming, watch. Pi won the Director's Award at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival. --Jenny Brown

Customer Reviews

Absolutely fabulous movies.
I simply love this director. His style is so intense and forward that it's almost scary, but with each film here, he leaves you with a movie so powerful and unafraid of itself that you will never forget a single minute of it. They may shock you, they may frighten you, they may nauseate you, but they're never indulging, only giving you the truth. The descent of each movie is not glamorous, but it's bound to impact you. I recommend that even if you have never even heard of either of these, you should buy them both site-unseen. A great deal for such great movies!

Both are great
These are both fabulous movies giving us the world on drugs and the mathematical thriller. Both by Darren Aronofsky, these films rank on my top ten of greatest. Pi, filmed in black and white, explores the world of Max Cohen and his knowledge of the 216 digit number everyone wants. The ending is quite a shocker and wil stay in your head for days. The music accompanied by the movie is also quite powerful. Requiem for a Dream explores the rise and fall of four very similar people on drugs. Ellen Burstyn, who takes diet pills not knowing they are drugs, gives a knock out preformance and should have won best actress. Jared Leto i very real and powerful. Jennifer Connely bares from waist to bottom in an inspiring scene and also gives a powerful preformance. Marlon Wayans gives one if on his only great acting display. The quick cut shots and the fifteen minute ending, will also stay in your head. But the both of them. You will not regret it.

buy it
my brother bought requiem for a dream a while ago and i watched it for the fourth time today. instead of just watching, i really thought about what was happening during the movie and i have never been as shocked by a movie as this one. requiem for a dream shows in plain reality what heroin and amphetamines can do to people and others around them, without glorifying them like trainspotting does. What makes this movie even more powerful is the fact that it can happen to anyone. this movie is like a scared-straight video.