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. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Desson Thomson
    30
    While director Aronofsky pistol-whips your attention with his style, the characters (mostly relegated to human mannequins in Aronofsky's visual schemes) suffer big time.
  2. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Stephen Hunter
    20
    In the end the movie goes nowhere a hundred movies haven't already been and tells us nothing we don't already know. It does so with so much violent energy, however, it's like four brutal years at film school crammed into an hour and a half.
  3. Boston Globe
    Reviewed by: Jay Carr
    38
    It's two hours of slumming in a vision of hell hatched from bourgeois comfort. That, and not its unsavory subject matter, is what makes it bummer theater.
  4. Film.com
    Reviewed by: Ernest Hardy
    30
    Too self-consciously dark, too aware of its long, murky, art-designed descent into the underbelly of America's addictive personality.

User Reviews

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User Score
8.5 out of 10

Universal acclaim- based on 270 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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