Requiem for a Dream
Metascore
68 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 32 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 22 out of 32
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 32
  3. Negative: 4 out of 32
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  1. Philadelphia Inquirer
    Reviewed by: Desmond Ryan
    100
    Aronofsky has fashioned a chilling vision that lives up to the caustic irony of its title and gives us a nightmare that is not lightly forgotten.
  2. San Francisco Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Bob Graham
    100
    He (Aronofsky) has put together a phantasmagoria of self-destructive obsession that is so visually astounding it becomes its own saving grace. Otherwise, we might not be able to bear it.
  3. Entertainment Weekly
    Reviewed by: Owen Gleiberman
    100
    May be the first movie to fully capture the way that drugs dislocate us from ourselves.
  4. Rolling Stone
    Reviewed by: Peter Travers
    100
    No one interested in the power and magic of movies should miss it.
    All this critic's reviews
  5. Portland Oregonian
    Reviewed by: Shawn Levy
    91
    Burstyn is astonishing, forsaking all vanity to make silly biddy Sara a fully dimensioned human being.
  6. Dallas Observer
    Reviewed by: Bill Gallo
    90
    A fluent, intelligent piece of work whose sex and violence are anything but gratuitous, and exactly the kind of highly personal, no-holds-barred vision of life on the ragged edge that independents always aspire to but rarely have the goods to achieve.
  7. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Kevin Thomas
    90
    A work of art whose beauty has the eternal power of redemption.
  8. The New York Times
    Reviewed by: A.O. Scott
    90
    Be warned: it's a downer, and a knockout.
  9. Chicago Sun-Times
    Reviewed by: Roger Ebert
    88
    Aronofsky brings a new urgency to the drug movie by trying to reproduce, through his subjective camera, how his characters feel, or want to feel, or fear to feel.
  10. Miami Herald
    Reviewed by: Rene Rodriguez
    88
    Easily the most searing movie-going experience of the year.
  11. New York Daily News
    Reviewed by: Jack Mathews
    88
    Locks in on its self-destructive subjects so precisely, it's almost unbearable to watch.
  12. New York Post
    Reviewed by: Jonathan Foreman
    88
    A powerful fable about love and addiction that manages to be darkly humorous when it isn't graphic or harrowing in the extreme.
  13. Baltimore Sun
    Reviewed by: Chris Kaltenbach
    88
    An unrelentingly dark vision that's as hard to watch as it is impossible to walk away from.

User Reviews

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User Score
8.5 out of 10

Universal acclaim- based on 269 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 112 out of 126
  2. Mixed: 4 out of 126
  3. Negative: 10 out of 126
  1. twest55
    10
    Fine piece of work. From every aspect. You can tell the cast and crew worked so hard to compose a phenomenal film, like nothing you have seen before.… Full Review »
  2. RoryP.
    5
    I think this film is overrated. Although it is an awful lot better then his last film, the Fountain. The film reliance on style causes problems, especially in the first act, where we are introduced to split screen and various other stylistic devices for no other reason then to give the film a professional sheen. There use in these areas were shallow and pointless, they did not progess any element of the story. I think if Aronofsky had laid off at the beginning and let the stylistic devices build up as the addictions took hold, it could have been a much better film. There is little character development. It appears to be a film situated in an … Full Review »
  3. NedRyerson1
    8
    Requiem for a Dream is a breathtaking movie and this is because of the topics that treat and point of view that give them. The film talks about family conflicts, couple problems, friend disagreements, racist fights, poor environments and all of these immersed in the drugs world. Obviously the points of view towards these problems are four, the one of Harry (who is trying to be successful and have a job), his girlfriend (who is looking her happily ever after), his mother (who wants to be remembered after her dead, by appear on television) and his best friend (who is hoping to live without worries and just enjoying the moment). In another way, this people is trying to accomplish something that is very difficult to find in the real world, so the solution is to escape from the reality; here is when the four path joins in a common point: the drugs, which represent the release of their minds. In this part Darren Aronofsky use the expressionist and surrealistic images, like the sequence when they take drugs, the attack of the TV people with the refrigerator and the zombie ending. Finally the four people end in the same way as if they were only one body. All of this is enhance by a marvelous direction, astonishing performances, excellent script and shocking music. This is a requiem for the beloved housewife, the worker son, the empathic girlfriend and the supporting friend. It is a requiem for achieving perfection. A Requiem for a Dream.… Full Review »
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