Lucas, John (September 16, 2010). "Treasuring Hubert Selby Jr". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077 . Retrieved April 29, 2020. Darren Aronofsky's direction creates an unsettling atmosphere that brings out the worst in each character's story arc. Connelly: My son, Kai, was a baby at that time, and so I had him with me on set. He was with me every day. I was still nursing him. It was a very strange, split world, because the reality of my life was so different from the reality of Marion’s life at that time. I have an amazing photograph somewhere, where I’m getting ready to go out and I have this intense, elaborate makeup on. And I’m looking in the mirror and doing my makeup and you can see the camera in the photograph. And you can see I’m holding Kai as a baby at the bottom of the frame, getting ready to do this scene that’s a really difficult time in this character’s life.

Aronofsky: I wanted to cast Dave Chappelle. I had a bunch of friends that were in the comedy scene, and I’d seen him onstage and thought he was amazing. I begged him, but he wasn’t really interested in acting at the time. So he passed. But I always felt like a comedian for that role would be great. There were so many great actors for that role that could have done it, but Marlon just came in and there was a level of commitment — I think he didn’t shower for three days. Jay Rabinowitz, editing: There were other takes where she was brilliant but this, there was something so special. We really never could imagine going with another take. This is something that you come across in editing — you have to make these decisions between technical perfection and magic.

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Rabinowitz: We took a still frame from every image, from a certain point to the end, and we pasted them around the editing room. The first time you would get maybe 12 frames of each image. The second time you would get maybe one less. Each one was a few frames shorter. In the United States, the film was originally rated NC-17 by the Motion Picture Association of America, but Aronofsky appealed the rating, claiming that cutting any portion of the film would dilute its message. The appeal was denied, and Artisan Entertainment decided to release the film unrated. [36] An R-rated version was released on video, with the sex scene edited, but the rest of the film identical to the unrated version. Watson: The first time I can remember showing it to people was at the midnight screening at Cannes. There’s all this lead-up and hullabaloo, and after the movie screens, they shine a spotlight on the filmmakers. So all the actors, and all the people that came involved in the movie, we all sat together and watched this movie in this massive 3,000-person screening room. You could feel this electric feeling as we were watching it. Libatique: That scene was difficult to shoot because — whose scene is it? Ultimately, it’s Sara’s, because Sara is actually, whether she intends to or not, showing Harry what’s become of her in her loneliness. Harry’s coming to the realization of what’s happened to her, ironically after enjoying some success selling drugs. There’s a moment where we had her looking left to right, where you start to realize she’s grinding her teeth, and the camera wraps around Harry and ends up on his other shoulder. And now, we’re on the other side of things. a b Howe, Dessen (November 3, 2000). "A Hopeless 'Dream' ". Washington Post. Archived from the original on May 2, 2018 . Retrieved February 28, 2022.

Toronto International Film Festival Coverage: List of Films (TIFF 2000)". DigitalHit.com. Archived from the original on September 25, 2019 . Retrieved March 14, 2020. Skorin-Kapov, Jadranka (2015) Darren Aronofsky's Films and the Fragility of Hope, p.32 Bloomsbury Academic It is not long before she learns to compromise: “Well, it really depends on how you measure: loose or tight. All Sara did was push out the air between the pieces of lettuce.” From self-deceit Sara moves to obsession to other states of “altered consciousness” in which her mind is dominated by images of eating as Selby astutely uses dreamlike phenomena as strategies of indirect discourse to move our consciousness along with that of the character: “A couple of nights of dreaming and Sara decided enough already. She got the name of the doctor from her lady friend and made an appointment. I dont know from diet pills, but eggs and grapefruit Ive had up to here thank you.” The diet pills are not, then, the first step in what leads to Sara’s psychotic undoing; the first step is her addiction to the American dream, as she watches it on the screen, as she eats it from the seductive boxes. Powell, Anna (2007). Deleuze, Altered States and Film. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. p. 75. ISBN 978-0-7486-3282-4. It was the beginning of having to learn to surrender to the moment and not hold on to something. I had to learn to do all of my work ahead of time, and then surrender to the scene in the moments that I was there and we were filming, because I wasn’t really able to walk around inhabiting someone else’s world.The novel was grimly forensic in detailing the physical and mental destruction wrought by drug addiction on a quartet of characters: three of them connected in their youth and knowing submission to heroin, and the fourth an elderly Brooklyn widow, drawn obliviously into amphetamine psychosis by solitude, TV fixation and irresponsibly prescribed diet pills. It’s a slender story that makes its essential points early, often and obviously: we’re all vulnerable to some manner of addiction, and legal ones aren’t necessarily safer or less ruinous than their underworld counterparts. Arnold, William (November 3, 2000). " 'Requiem' is overdose of junkie slice of life". Seattle-Post Intelligencer. Archived from the original on June 22, 2001 . Retrieved March 14, 2020. A number of actresses were considered for the role of Sara Goldfarb, but many of them rejected the part. Faye Dunaway turned it down. [12] Ellen Burstyn also initially rejected the part due to the depressing content, but her manager convinced her to see Aronofsky's previous work; she was impressed and agreed to be cast in the lead role. [8] [13] [14] Giovanni Ribisi, Neve Campbell and Dave Chappelle were considered for the roles of Harry Goldfarb, Marion Silver and Tyrone C. Love, respectively. All three declined. [8] The producers settled with Jared Leto, who was keen on the challenge, followed by Jennifer Connelly. "When I read the script, it was really something I wanted to do. I thought the script was brilliant. It was so creative. I thought it was really brave. It was talking about really important issues", she said. [15] Marlon Wayans read the novel three times and auditioned five times for the role of Tyrone before he was offered the part, eager to work with the director. [16]

Wayans: We sat with addicts. We went to a clinic and talked about the effects of heroin. We did a lot of research. Darren took my shirt off and made me walk around the streets of New York in February because he wanted me to understand what it was like — what winter in New York was going to feel like even though he was filming in the summer. I was like, Hey bro, I grew up in New York. I know how cold it is. I don’t have to do this. Wayans: Everybody has a deficiency. Everybody has a deep-seated pain that allows them to seek drugs and artificial elation. At the end of the day, I think [the movie is] about really coping and dealing with what’s hurting you. Finding a sober way to deal with that and fill yourself with love. Because it’s all a deficiency of love that drives us to do the things that we do that ultimately destroy us.

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Rabinowitz: It was upsetting to me, how far he pushed the actors. That led us into an elaborate conversation because he was like, “Why is everybody so sensitive about sex but you can show people getting killed?” And I remember one of my arguments was, “Yeah, but the killing is fake and so is the sex.” The ramp up at the end was mathematical, but that was not so much the case with that wild sex party. We had to sift and sift — it wasn’t as beautifully designed as everything else he was doing. I’m proud of what we did, it came out pretty good.

Rebello, Stephen (June 1, 2002). "Through The Eyes Of Faye Dunaway". Movieline. Retrieved October 2, 2016. Gleiberman, Owen (October 13, 2000). "Movie Review: 'Requiem for a Dream' Review". Entertainment Weekly. Archived from the original on December 14, 2014 . Retrieved December 13, 2014. Bancroft was, at this time, coming off playing the Miss Havisham equivalent in Alfonso Cuarón’s 1998 Great Expectations and voicing the Queen in Antz. BBC - Films - interview - Darren Aronofsky". www.bbc.co.uk. Archived from the original on April 26, 2019 . Retrieved March 13, 2020.Rabinowitz: So much of what everybody loves about the editing of Requiem for a Dream was baked into the script. The first time there was one of those micro and macro image montages, he explains what each shot is. “SNAP, she opens the cap. BOOM, she pops one into the palm of her hand.” And he had these sound effects in all caps. And the second time he did it, he explained a lot less in the script. And the third time, it just said, “SNAP, POP, BOOM, BANG,” and you knew she took another pill. Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian lauded the film as an "agonising and unflinchingly grim portrait of drug abuse" and "a formally pleasing piece of work—if pleasing can possibly be the right word". [45] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone wrote that "no one interested in the power and magic of movies should miss it". [46] Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly, who gave the work an "A" grade, argued that it "may be the first movie to fully capture the way drugs dislocate us from ourselves" and said, "The movie, a full-throttle mind-bender, is hypnotically harrowing and intense, a visual and spiritual plunge into the seduction and terror of drug addiction". [47] Scott Brake of IGN gave the film a 9.0 out of 10 and argued, "The reason it works so well as a film about addiction is that, in every frame, the film itself is addictive. It's absolutely relentless, from Aronofsky's bravura cinematic techniques (split screens, complex cross-cutting schemes, hallucinatory visuals) to Clint Mansell's driving, hypnotic score (performed by the Kronos Quartet), the movie compels you to watch it". [48] The film was listed as the 29th best-edited film of all time in a 2012 survey by members of the Motion Picture Editors Guild. [82]