Taglines: Life is one long insane trip. Some people just have better directions.
Donnie Darko doesn’t get along too well with his family, his teachers and his classmates; but he does manage to find a sympathetic friend in Gretchen, who agrees to date him. He has a compassionate psychiatrist, who discovers hypnosis is the means to unlock hidden secrets. His other companion may not be a true ally.
Donnie has a friend named Frank – a large bunny which only Donnie can see. When an engine falls off a plane and destroys his bedroom, Donnie is not there. Both the event, and Donnie’s escape, seem to have been caused by supernatural events. Donnie’s mental illness, if such it is, may never allow him to find out for sure.
Donnie Darko is a 2001 science fiction film written and directed by Richard Kelly. It stars Jake Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, Drew Barrymore, Mary McDonnell, Katharine Ross, Patrick Swayze, Noah Wyle, and Maggie Gyllenhaal. The film follows the adventures of the troubled title character as he seeks the meaning behind his doomsday-related visions.
Filmed over the course of 28 days (coincidentally mirroring the time transpired in the movie), the film was almost released straight-to-video. Donnie Darko was screened at the Sundance Film Festival on January 19, 2001, before receiving a limited theatrical release on October 26, 2001 by Flower Films. Due to the film’s advertising featuring a crashing plane and the September 11 attacks that transpired a month before, the film was scarcely advertised. In the end, Donnie Darko grossed just under $7.3 million worldwide.
Although the film was always meant to be set in 1988, Kelly admitted he felt pressured to make the setting more contemporary; but, he couldn’t figure out how to make the story work in such a setting and retained the original setting. Frank, the giant rabbit, was inspired by the novel Watership Down, with the novel’s censorship being a plot point before being abandoned in the final version. Newer information has shown that the costume could also have been an inspiration of a dream that Kelly had.
Donnie Darko was filmed in 28 days which, by coincidence, virtually matches the time that transpires in the film from October 2, 1988, to the Friday or Saturday weekend party before Halloween on Monday, October 31, 1988. The budget for the film was $4.5 million.
About the Story
On October 2, 1988 Donnie Darko, a troubled teenager living in the town of Middlesex, Virginia, sleepwalks outside and meets a figure in a monstrous rabbit costume, who introduces himself as “Frank” and tells him the world will end in 28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, and 12 seconds. At dawn, Donnie returns home to find a jet engine has crashed into his bedroom. His older sister, Elizabeth, informs him that the FAA investigators do not know where it came from.
Donnie tells his psychotherapist, Dr. Thurman, about his continuing visits from Frank. Sleepwalking under Frank’s influence, he floods his school by damaging a water main. He also begins dating a new student named Gretchen Ross, who has recently moved into town with her mother under a new identity to escape her violent stepfather. Gym teacher Kitty Farmer blames the flooding on the influence of the short story “The Destructors”, assigned by dedicated English teacher Karen Pomeroy, and begins teaching attitude lessons taken from motivational speaker Jim Cunningham. Donnie rebels against these motivational lessons, leading to friction between Kitty and Rose, Donnie’s mother.
Donnie asks his science teacher, Dr. Kenneth Monnitoff, about time travel after Frank brings up the topic, and is given the book The Philosophy of Time Travel, written by Roberta Sparrow, a former science teacher at the school who is now a seemingly senile old woman. Dr. Thurman tells Donnie’s parents that he is detached from reality, and that his visions of Frank are “daylight hallucinations”, symptomatic of paranoid schizophrenia.
Donnie disrupts a speech being given by Jim Cunningham by insulting him in front of the student body, then burns down Cunningham’s house on instructions from Frank. When police find evidence of a child pornography operation in the house’s remains, Cunningham is arrested. During his hypnotherapy session, Donnie confesses his crimes to Dr. Thurman and says that Frank will soon kill someone.
Rose agrees to replace Kitty as chaperone for her daughter Samantha’s dance troupe in Los Angeles, so Kitty can testify in Cunningham’s defense; with her husband Eddie in New York on business, her older children are home alone.
Donnie and Elizabeth take the opportunity to throw a Halloween party to celebrate her acceptance to Harvard. Gretchen arrives, distraught because her mother disappeared. Realizing that only hours remain before Frank’s prophesied end of the world, Donnie takes Gretchen and two friends to seek Roberta Sparrow at her house.
They are attacked by two school bullies, Seth and Ricky, who are attempting to rob Sparrow’s house, and the fight spills into the street. An oncoming Pontiac Trans Am car swerves to avoid Sparrow, who went for her daily walk to check her mailbox, but runs over Gretchen instead, killing her. The driver turns out to be Frank Anderson, wearing the same rabbit costume as the Frank of Donnie’s visions. Donnie shoots him in his eye with his father’s gun.
Donnie Darko (2001)
Directed by: Richard Kelly
Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, Drew Barrymore, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Mary McDonnell, Katharine Ross, Patrick Swayze, Noah Wyle, Jolene Purdy, Daveigh Chase
Screenplay by: Richard Kelly
Production Design by: Alec Hammond
Cinematography by: Steven Poster
Film Editing by: Sam Bauer, Eric Strand
Costume Design by: April Ferry
Set Decoration by: Jennie Harris
Music by: Michael Andrews
MPAA Rating: R for language, some drug use and violence.
Distributed by: Pandora Cinema, Newmarket Films
Release Date: October 26, 2001
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