Groovy Movies

Donnie Darko (2001)

• Season 5 • Episode 2

Share episode

This week we sift through the web lore of one of the original multiverse movies, Donnie Darko. We relish seeing adolescent Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal squabble at the dinner table and ponder why a 23-year-old directing wunderkind never succeeded with a follow-up.

References
Pages from the fictional book "The Philosophy of Time Travel" by Roberta Sparrow aka Grandma Death
Donnie Darko’s BTS production video diary 
An oral history of Donnie Darko

-----------
If you love what we do, please like, subscribe and leave a review!

Edited and produced by Lily Austin and James Brailsford
Original music by James Brailsford

Instagram
TikTok
Email us

Unknown:

Every film should have a dance routine of some kind. Welcome to groupie movies. My name is Lily Austin and my name is James Brailsford. Hello. Hello, and welcome to another episode of the above mentioned, groovy movies. How you doing, James? I'm all right, yeah, good to get going slightly, slightly my brain's not quite fully kicking in today, just because of our slightly earlier than usual recording time. It's true, we usually like to record over lunch with a nice glass of red but today needs muff. It's 9am we're both a little bit sleepy and groggy, but at least we're talking about a film that that's almost in keeping with actually, I wasn't even thinking about that, but it's a film, oh yeah, exists between sleep and the awake. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And also, it's one that we both know quite a lot about. So I think it should be fine. James, what are we talking about this week? We are talking about Richard Kelly's 2001 film. Donnie Darko, for all our millennial five I know it's crazy. We've never talked about it before. It's such a well, I don't know. I feel like it's it's such an quintessential film of adolescence that you will have watched when you're a teenager and and felt like it spoke to you deeply, and you feel like, Finally, I'm understood, and I'm also a bit don't go and or would go out with him, or at least, was that just me? Absolutely. I mean, it fits into that genre. Doesn't it have disaffected youth. But for me, because I've been a little bit older, I this was 2001 this was it that around this time was so good for if you were a film lover, and especially if you'd just gone to film school, and you, you know, you went to the cinema, it was Memento Donnie Darko um Eternal Sunshine and Spotless Mind. I mean, three that came out just, just great films to see as a film student, this being one of them, you know, yeah, I, I reassert my, my frequent argument that 911 changed everything with cinema. And pre 911 we were, like, hitting the peak of, like, Great filmmaking. And then after that, it all changed and, and commercialization took over and and this is like a perfect example of that, because this film came out on the Halloween weekend after 911 and that really, really impacted the sales. So it had a budget. This film was very small. Budget, 4.5 mil. And unfortunately, when it came out, it was pretty much a flop. Immediately, like no one wanted to go see a film about a depressed adolescent who has to deal with some kind of plane crash. It's just terrible timing. Terrible timing. But yeah, with, with that box office, it was specific in America, it bombed. I think, I think in America, in its domestic box office, they call I think, I think it was like a half million dollars. It was terrible. I mean, God, that's one from the heart numbers. But so, you know, it absolutely bombed. Nobody saw it, really. We didn't come into the pop culture. Nobody was discussing Donnie Darko in mainstream America. But then it came over to the UK, and I remember getting the the DVD release of this when it came out, and there was actually a, like, a little note in the DVD, like a one sided printed sheet. And it was a personal like, thank you from Richard Kelly to say thank you, because it was actually the UK and Ireland's box office that actually helped it break even. So it made about four or 5 million in the UK. So not a great amount of money in the UK, but still, still enough to have COVID its budget. And essentially, they say that it's because of the UK and and Ireland adopting it and kind of really getting into it for some reason that it kind of gave it this second life that then you got a decent home video release where it then made a fortune in home video sales. Yeah, I read an interview with Jake Gyllenhaal where he talked about being in London for a play. And then because some of that, there was a bit of buzz around the film, doing press and being, like, shocked at how many people came up to him and said what an amazing film it was, and how much they loved it, because they just hadn't had that in the US. And then because of that success, they then had them financing to do a director's cut and kind of, yeah, give it a proper release on DVD in the US, where it then began to get some momentum and like, and get a cold following over there, kind of following. And also, I was the film, the song from the end of the film, Mad World, that iconic tears for fizz. Song was, uh, re recorded by the two musicians who, like worked on the film and especially for it, and kind of slowed it down like the the the original version, which I didn't even remember. I thought that the song in the in Donnie Darko was the original, but no, it's like a more upbeat kind of song. And then the one for Donnie Darko, you. Yeah, it's like much more in keeping with the actual lyrics. And that became a number one, a Christmas number one in the UK that year. So it was, it was a great time, because I remember being so excited that the Mad World was Christmas number one. And I think it beat off one of those, one of those generic pop idols, or whatever they call it, or one of those kind of competitions. I think whatever their Christmas single was, it beat that off. And it's like this quite, quite morose song from the end of an indie, indie film about, like a time traveling teen or something like this is great, but, but I was thinking the same when I was re watching it for this podcast, Lily, you know what? You hit the nail on the head. I was just thinking, Christ, this was a product of this time where these kind of films could get a chance, even though they were very low budget, but the fact that they were being made at all, that they were, there was an audience for this kind of stuff that it was. It wasn't a franchise film. It's not it's a one off story. And I was like, Oh my God, we've become used to like serialized storytelling, whether that be kind of TV episodes or, like, franchise films, that's like, the mainstream is now that, yeah, absolutely. Okay, well, we're kind of, we've already dived right in without just assuming everyone has seen and knows this film. Sorry, yes, we'll, I guess we'll do a quick plot summary, just to, like, situate ourselves. I I sort of wrote a plot summary, and then I saw a much better and more succinct one online. So if you'll allow me, I'll read this one out. Boy meets girl in a tangent universe created by a rupture in the space time continuum due to boys sleepwalking as a jet engine falls onto his bedroom setting. Girl on the path to being run over by a car driven by a guy dress as a demonic bunny rabbit, then boy must set the universe back on track, sacrificing himself to save girl and the world. I mean, that's, that's it in a nutshell. And it's, that's kind of it spoilers, and like looking back, maybe I did get it, but I don't remember as an adolescent, really understanding the whole tangent universe lit off from your universe concept, like, I feel like that. A lot of that went over my head, and I almost feel like it really doesn't matter. You can take from this film what you want. Like for me, this was a film about, you know, the loneliness and feeling of otherness that you often have as an adolescent, and the general kind of, like navel gazing sadness that a lot of us have when we're a teenager and and that, and that and everything else around it is sort of like, I don't know, some kind of physical or fantastical manifestation of that. And that was what I liked about it. And like the music, obviously, incredible music. Yeah, exactly. I mean, it's, I would say it's borderline impossible to really fully follow what's going on without kind of, probably re watching it, plus additional internet research. I mean, you know, so, so just taking it as a whole kind of experience. You know, I loved it the first time because, you know, you can't quite tell what's going on, but it's got a unique atmosphere that feels very thought through. So if that kind of pulls you in, but, but, um, but watching this, though, I was struck by how I think, when this came out, the idea of parallel universes and tangent universes wasn't yet a mainstream narrative device. You know, it certainly was. It wasn't like it was unheard of, but certainly as a as a storytelling tool, to say, oh, right, he's in a tangent universe. There was much more of a what, a why, whereas now that's now become the mainstream, I mean, kind of, basically we've since I was a child, the idea that there are parallel universes wasn't really given much scientific weight, but that's now kind of the the overriding theory of essentially how the universe works is kind of parallel universes. It's, it's crossed over scientifically mainstream, but now storytelling like you know, the fact that Marvel films have got multiverses and all that kind of stuff. It's just, it's, it's probably not as big a hard a cell as it used to be. I think, yeah, I think reading about how difficult it was for for them to get funding to get this film off the ground, and how how everyone found it so weird. I feel like, because of Donnie Darko and the films that followed today, this wouldn't be such a weird story. Yeah, yeah, it's not. It is. It's actually quite the norm to have exactly these sort of parallel, you know, everything everywhere, all at once, for example, you know, very much on the these same ideas, and it's, and it didn't, certainly didn't feel like a new, like The Matrix, you know, all these things like that was like, so new back then. The other thing that I think is amazing about this film is that it was, it's, it's a period film about the 19 late 1988 so it was made. When they came to make the film, it was about 12 years afterwards. That was a completely new thing to do a period film about a recent history and definitely in about the 80s. Apparently it was like, that was like a big part of the challenge with their small budget was to do, to do the. Period setting, because it just wasn't a thing, whereas now this is, you know, completely common. We have movies set into that the 2000s you know, everyone understands the like, the joy of, like, recent nostalgia for another, but not so long ago, a familiar recent time period, I can remember at the time actually thinking that when I was watching it, thinking, this is, this is fascinating, because, like, I remember the 80s. I grew up in the 80s, and it didn't seem that dim and distant. So, yeah, to suddenly see a recent history that that was a kind of quite unique feeling at the time. Yeah, so we've got to talk about Richard Kelly, because this is all from the brain of a 25 year old, 23 year old, I think, when he wrote the script, insane. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, funnily enough, I am I met one of Richard Kelly's university friends who said, Oh yeah. I you know, I knew him while he was writing the script to Donnie Darko, been knocking it around for years, all that kind of stuff. But he couldn't believe that I'd heard Donnie Darko because he mentioned it in passing as this film that his his mate from university made. And I was like, what is one of the best films has ever been released in last few years? And he's like, nobody's heard of it in America at all. But yeah, a very, very young director to make a film that is interesting, because watching Donnie Darko, I mean, I was so excited by his what his next few films were going to be. And, you know, from watching Donnie Darko, you see a lot of potential. You know, there's his career, it felt like there's a potential for another young Spielberg, or something like that. There's behind the camera, yeah, just, just like, there's, it feels like this potential there that never, never quite came off. And, yeah, anyway, sorry, I don't get too much into his post career. Yeah, we can. We can go into that further down, but I agree. It's it, yeah, there's a lot of, there's a lot of promise, promise in this film. And it's, it's kind of, it is a little surprising that it kind of Yeah, much further than this. But let's focus on the positives. Let's talk about the beauty of this. So, yeah, so basically, Richie Kelly was out of film school and was like, scrambling around, like, I've got to come up with an idea. I've got to make it bigger. Like he was feeling the pressure this, the all this weight on his 23 year old shoulders, and he read about, uh, in the news about a boy who's some ice, a large amount of ice, somehow had fallen into his his bedroom, and it was just by luck that he hadn't been in the room at the time, so his life was saved. And that kind of sparked this idea of, you know, close calls and and I guess it kind of sparked the idea of the parallel universe, like, what would happen if it had happened, what happens if it doesn't? And that was kind of the start of it, really. And then he said that he wrote it in this kind of like stream of consciousness, thug over 28 days, which is the amount of time in the film that the film is set over. One of the things, the interesting things about the film is these title cards that come up saying, kind of counting down as we as the film goes on, 28 days till the end of the world, 27 point, you know, three hours till, etc, it's, and that's, and that's quite a nice thing. That kind of like situates you and keeps the anticipation going like, what's going to happen? What exactly is the end of the world going to be? Yeah, and it's actually was a great marketing tool to remember all the marketing was about, you know, 20 it would have, like a countdown on the poster, so immediately you hooked in, like, How Why is the world ending? How is it ending? It like, it was a great, like premise to kind of draw you in. And it was Christopher Nolan's idea, wasn't it? I beg your pardon? Yes, there's always a Christopher Nolan link. So what found a Christopher Nolan link that I didn't know about Lily? What the hell the tables have turned? Okay, in every film I'm gonna look for the Christopher Nolan and the Kubrick link, and there's one. There's both in this movie. Okay, so we're jumping around a little, but let's roll with it. So after so once the film got finished, its premiere was at Sundance Film Festival, where it also kind of flopped like first of all, no one believed that this was actually a small budget movie. No one believed it had been made before 4.5 mil because it looked so good. So everyone, kind of the snobs at Sundance didn't like it, because they were like, it's a big budget movie. It's not our kind of film. So it kind of died a death at Sundance and wasn't being picked up. So they were like, shit, it's gonna have to go straight to DVD. We're not gonna get any distribution whatsoever. And then somehow they managed to get a meeting with Christopher Nolan and his wife. They'd put on a screening for him, because this is 2001 so he's just done. He's about Memento time, so he's not done, but he's not done insomnia. He's just, he's coming up exactly he Well, he done Memento and I think I don't know, had it been released at that point. I don't know it. Was, it was released in 2001 so I don't know, like, maybe it hadn't been released, but okay, but he sat in the screening room with his wife and the people from new market, who did, who, I don't, who, who released memento, or did they produce it? Yeah, no, they, I don't know. The bit I think they produce, release, distribute, whatever memento. And also Donnie Darko didn't they write exactly, so that was how so they did a screening, and they weren't sure about it, but Christopher Nolan was like, You guys have got to release this movie. This is incredible, but he they did give some notes. And one of the things was Christopher Nolan suggested that we have the brackets with the like, the specific, because it originally in the film. Date. It was like, Yeah, 22nd of October, or whatever. And, and his suggestion was to add that countdown just again to Yeah, that ticking clock Exactly, exactly. And they also did a few reshoots in the summer to kind of make it a bit more, make the the idea a bit clearer. So I'd have been, I'd be interested to see the actual original film, because it sounds like it would, yeah, it's still already quite a confusing film, but you do get the thread through. And apparently it was a little bit less coherent before that, but they shaped it up and then put it out. And that's then that, and that's the film that we see today, unless you watch the artist cut, which is a whole other story. Well, I was about to say, yeah, it's actually, I think you've got to be on your on on alert when you're watching Donnie Darko, because I did notice, I don't know if it's changed, but a few years ago, I remember browsing through but this was a few years ago when they still had physical media everywhere. So I was browsing the DVDs, and I noticed that the only version Donnie Darko that I could pick up was the Director's Cut. It did seem to be everywhere and and I have to say, I was very excited this director's cut. And lesson was learned here is that sometimes that sometimes the fact that there were these various factors imposed on a film that, for some reason, meant the directors didn't have total control. In some cases, and I think dolly dock is a prime example, it made the film better, and actually allowing the director to finish it as they intended, is it kind of it's not the best version of the film. I was in Manchester at the time. So it came to one of the cinemas in Manchester, and just to have everything spell out, it really just took away all the mystery and all the magic and and also it was so clunky done Lily, like, basically the film, yeah, just just, there's just moments in the film where it goes to a full screen, essentially, like a PowerPoint slide. And it's meant to be an extract from Madam death, is it lady deaths, her book? It's from the kind of theory of time travel book and but it's like, it's clearly a computer graphic. It doesn't feel like an insert and like it just pulls you out of the story, just because you see, like, oh, right, there's now, there's now a slide I have to read. And it's not like, like the ones that come up in the in the original film, where it's like, on black and it's white. And the thing is, these, sorry, grandma, death. Sorry. Sorry, yes, grandma, no. I was just suddenly playing, who was that she carry on? Grandma, death, yeah, yeah. And so, so, like, it absolutely spells out what is happening on screen, but it just pulls you out of the story to kind of have these. It just doesn't feel naturally bedded in. It feels like they've got, oh shit. I want to put some shots of her diary pages in so we'll just see Jay. And the thing is, those diary pages are actually available if you do the online website mystery. And that's perfect, because that's like a little easter egg where, if you're committed, you find a bit more of a story. But then it was basically that just transplanted into the film, and it clearly wasn't meant to be there. Yes, yeah. My my fiance is also a big fan of Dolly Docker, and he told me, Oh yeah, the the director's cut really makes the story very clear. And that's like, Yeah, that's interesting, if you're interested in this, in that part of it, which he very much is as a physicist. But I'm like, the beauty of the film is the the mystery of clarity, exactly the mystery the like, that's what's so good about it. I don't want things spelled out for me. And also, I there's something very cool about I love, you know, I love texts in films. Like, it's so cool when a book is is part of a story in a film. And it's cool that you could see it on a website. We'll add the website to the show notes. You can take a look you and it's cool to see those pages as Richard Kelly created them, because he's an incredible artist, and he actually pretty much anything you see drawn in Dorney Darko, Richard Kelly had drawn himself, the picture of of the bunnies mask that you see in in Frank's room that he drawn that himself. So that's cool to see. But, yeah, you don't need it in the film. Like, we get enough of the idea and, like, what we don't understand is adds to it. So okay, I'm glad I wasn't completely sure about what the deal was, the director's cut was, but I'm glad we opted to not watch that one. I'd never gonna see it. I don't want that. I can't recommend it at all. I like, I mean, that's why I was kind of specific when we're talking. This. Let's make sure we both watch the theatrical release, because, because then, basically, the the, I think, new market, as I think, essentially insisted, or whoever was about to distribute it, insisted that it become underneath the two hour mark. So it's about one hour 54 including credit. So it was fairly arbitrary, because then you can get extra plays of it in the in the Multiplex, you know, you can, you can get an extra showing in if it's under two hours, want to go over two hours, it reduced the amount of daily showing so that, that was their logic. But then it was this hit, and so like, right? Let's give the director some money now so he can realize his vision. Well, I I'm happy for the under two hour version. I think it works perfectly. I think it's an occasion where studio meddling, let's say, or studio insistence. It doesn't. It does actually help the film, because a lot of times when studios start mandating things, the film feels choppy. But the thing is, because it's a dream, like film set in a parallel universe, that kind of slightly choppy, not quite sure what's going on, works with the atmosphere of the film, whereas I think it was a more straightforward drama, having sudden characters and things that chop, like, Who's the guy in the red tracksuit never explained, but it's okay in the, you know, it's okay in this kind of HOTCH Potch of strange things that are happening. That is Donnie Darko, yeah, okay. I that kind of leads us on nicely to the production of the film, because one of the interesting things about how this film got funded is that it was the casting of Jason Schwartzman that actually got the film going. And you may be thinking, Jason Schwartzman, is that that guy from Rushmore? Who is he in Donnie Darko? Well, you're you'd be right in wondering, because he was actually originally cast as Donnie Darko, and he he just made Rushmore at this point. So there was a lot of buzz around him as an actor, and that was what the film kind of that was initially what got the film up and running. Because initially, when the script was passed around, people loved it, but they didn't want a 25 year old to direct this film. His first movie, understandably, Richard Kelly was emphatic, no, I'm directing it. No one else gets this movie, which I think absolutely correct. It's definitely not the kind of film you could pass on. It's all in his mind. Absolutely, absolutely he did a matrix. He did a matrix. He wanted his first debut film to be something that he directed, not just wrote, exactly. So a little bit of financing came through that way, and a lot of buzz. And then next thing you know, Drew Barrymore invites Richard Kelly and his producer to her trailer on the set of Charlie's Angels, and tells them, I love this movie. And they're like, Oh, well, could you play the teacher? She's like, great. But also, can my production company, flower films produce the film? And they were like, Yes, please. That would be great. And that was what got them the rest of the funding. So good to go side off, and then Jason shorts and basically had to drop out because of scheduling issues. Thank God. Thank God. Because I'm sorry. I really don't think this film would be the cult film it is today if it wasn't for Jake Gyllenhaal in the lead. He is magnetic. He's picked perfect. Yeah. He's so good, yeah. And I to be honest, I think he'd been in a few things before then, but this film, I really think, is his professional peak at such a young age. Like he's amazing in it, and I've never seen him be so good in anything else since, even though he's been in a few good movies. Yeah, no, I think it's an iconic performance. Like I was blown away when I saw it, and it still holds up now, like 2020, plus years later. But yeah, when you say I didn't realize Jason Schwartzman was in the running originally, but I can, I can see that the kind of, as far as, like, the look, the similarity, the darker hair, the kind of slightly haunted like, but, but, yeah, yeah, he looks completely different. He looks perpetually tired. It's it works. But yeah, God, it would have been very fun. But the casting, though, I mean, and to see Maggie Gyllenhaal, you know, just in a supporting role, playing his, actually, his fictional sister. I mean, she like the chemistry between the two of them. It's like off the charts, yeah, Jake Gyllenhaal said that it was his idea to cast her, because at that point they were being really competitive in reality about that acting. Because even though Maggie, he, as he put it, is like a more kind of is a better actor, basically, and a bit more serious an actor, he had actually he, his career had taken off before her and also him being younger. So so they already had this energy between them. There was a rivalry going. So that actually is perfect to bring that to school. Yeah, and at the end, where, where the his sister's in tears, crying. I was watching that performance by Maggie Gillette, I was like, Oh my God, she's really feeling that She's devastated that that her brother has died. You can see she's really going somewhere in that, you know, it's, almost a little bit too good for the film. But, you know, can't really criticize something for being too good. But you're just like, wow, yeah, it's so true. And that kind of so that brings us on to the filming. There's an incredible, there's a great kind of behind the scenes, hour long video that you can see on YouTube. So good. I mean, it's not particularly. Well, put together. I will say that it's that she just, it's a video diary. It's called, it's more just, it's more like, behind the scenes, they've not done much with it. Yeah, they've really not done much. It's just, it's just clips from filming. But it's very interesting to see. Oh yeah, it's fascinating, especially because Stephen poster, the cinematographer, is kind of in it quite a lot, because it's kind of, it seems to be taken the first part of it from their location scouts. But Stephen poster was a very, very established, experienced cinematographer who was especially looking for like an up and coming director to work with, because, you know, a career as a cinematographer, you want to work with some established names, some big names, but you also want to keep an eye on the up and comers. Because hopefully you'll work with them on a low budget film, and they'll become big, you know, they could become the next Tarantino, and they'll take you with them. So he got a really incredible cinema talk, which you can that also helps with this low budget film. It doesn't look or feel low budget because it's beauties. It's kind of classically shot, you know? Well, that's amazing watching this behind the scenes footage, because you really see that despite his young years, like Richard Kelly, has such a clear vision for the film, you know, he really sees every shot. And it's amazing seeing him, him plotting out there, looking at, you know, the front of the school, and him talking about how it's going to be shot. And that is how it was shot, you know, it is his vision is clear, and he stays true to it. And I think, yeah, it definitely helps having a much older, more experienced cinematographer by your side, because then then you're in good hands, you know, they're going to help you get that over the line and make it look the way you want it to look like. That's a good combination. But there was a great bit of behind the scenes back and forth watching that, because there's a sequence in a kind of a hall in a school where this motivational speaker comes on Play by Patrick Swayze, and Dolly Darko gets up and he asks, How much are they paying you to be here? Or something along those lines. And in the behind the scenes, you can hear Richard Kelly saying, I want that to be a Crash Zoom, like a Crash Zoom. Push in to Donnie Darko when He delivers that line, and the cinematographer is not happy at all. He's like, you know, crash zooms, you know, we should do that. Basically says, He said, a whip pan is funny, a Crash Zoom isn't funny. And I was like, I can't remember what they do in the finished film. And watch the finished film, and it whip pan from Donnie Darko to some of the teachers looking horrified. Then it goes back to his Ah, so the cinematographers are right. He he won. And I love that. It's perfect. I also loved reading that Richard Kelly being so inexperienced as a director, when they when they started filming their very first take, the very first shot, he calls action. They do the scene, everyone's waiting for him to yell, cut, and he yells and anxious. Oh, bless him. It's so sweet. The other thing that's very interesting is that, you know, the how I mentioned that the script was written in 28 days, they also filmed it in 28 days. This whole really length of a tangent universe concept from the film that this is kind of the vague theory that the film is like, hung on the fact that it's this, the story is over 28 days, because that's how long a tangent universe can survive once it's it's been created. And yeah, they did everything in those 28 days shooting in and around Los Angeles. It's super impressive. It was clearly a labor of love for most people involved with that production. You know, you can, you know you can, you can tell everyone's trying to go the extra mile. Now, can we talk about the thing that I think one of the things that makes us such a rich film is there a lot of vignettes and additional gems within that like bring it all to life. The main thing is the the scene when Donny arrives at school and we've got another tears for fear song playing head over hills, and we have almost like a, I think it was done in four shots, but the camera pans round and weaves around the school, and you see different different members of the cast, basically, you know, different people who are going to that school. You see Patrick Swayze, for some reason, talking to one of the teachers, so, you know, he's going to come up again, this strange, strange character, and, and, and apparently the production company was so against the scene. They thought it was so indulgent, because it took a whole day to shoot, and then when they saw it, they saw the rushes at the end of the day, they were like, Okay, no, we're wrong. This is incredible, because it really just, like, sets it up. You know, this kind of music video esque setup to the film. I don't know what it what it does, but it just brings the whole thing to life. It really makes the adolescent element of the film crystallize. Oh, yeah. It's almost like it gives it a little title sequence. It kind of half went part way through the film. It almost gives it like an introductory quality. But again, watching it behind the scenes, it's clear that it was intended to be a complete Warner, you know, because you can hear him discussing with the cinematographers, going like and, okay, now the camera is going to go through the door, and you can tell that they obviously probably the cinematographer got him to break it up into smaller chunks. And I was watching thinking, yeah, it's much you. You don't have every shot doesn't have every time you do a slightly longer, complicated take. It doesn't have to be a complete one. You are allowed to have different shots to cut it up. And that's a perfect example. I think it would have, it wouldn't have worked as well if it'd have been tried to be one continuous take, but just breaking it down smaller shots, it all knits together very nicely. Yeah, totally. I think it, it's a perfect, perfect shot. And then the other thing I really wanted to talk about is sparkle motion. Don't question my commitment to sparkle motion. Lily, that's what's great about this movie, that there are a few iconic lines, suck a fuck, and I question your commitment to sparkle motion. So there's this interesting B plot we mentioned, Patrick Swayze. It's a great thing watching this movie, and then be like, oh, yeah, Patrick Swayze, isn't it? And, yeah, this very little treats. It's, it's giving um, did you ever see that Julianne Moore film? I've forgotten its name by that director that I love, Pedro Moldova, no, no. Todd Haynes, yes. Films safe, yes. This is very much giving. It's giving a bit of safe because we've got this. It's a bit culty, new agey self help guru guy. That's who Patrick Swayze plays. And there's this very eccentric PE teacher who is also the kind of manager of sparkle motion, which is this like dance troupe at the school that Donny darker sister is involved. Is the lead dancer of and Kitty farmer. This is the gym teacher. She's also, like number one fan, obsessed with Patrick Swayze and his whole ethos, which is that the opposite of fear is love, and we must not fear. We must love. And every issue that you have comes down to fear. I won't, I won't go into I don't want to spoil it, in case you guys haven't seen it, but Patrick Swayze is not all he he pretends to be. But there's this, like, funny, it's a it's a strange subplot, this whole thing of that's like sparkle motion is going around in the background, and we get this incredible scene of this dance routine to notorious. And I just, it just really makes me think that, like every film should have a dance routine of some kind. You know, it's really not, it's barely even like B plot. It's just a sort of an additional vignette within detail. Yeah, a detail. And it does have some, it does end up having a connection to to the bigger story, but it's pretty minor. It didn't need to be there. There could be any like it's not, it's not crucial, but it's such a joy. I love that dance routine. I want to learn it because you're not expecting it, and you're not, you know, you've not, you're not really expecting that. You don't know how if they're going to be good or bad, because they've not really been set up as if they're this amazing team or if they're a bad team. You say you say you don't know what to expect, but then it comes on and it's a great dance scene, and it's directed as if it's like a set piece for the film. So yeah, it kind of brings the whole film of life. Now, the thing about Patrick Swayze character is, when you think about it, of course, that in the universe that is created at the end of the film, he never gets exposed for what he really is. So it's only in the tangent universe when Donnie Darko does the different things that he does within that tangent universe that that he's exposed. And whereas when we go, when, when things are reset at the end of the film to go back to the main universe, he's never, you know, he's never outed, is he? Yeah, i Hey, I see now, because I was wondering what is the reason for Patrick Swayze storyline? And I guess that does add something, because it really makes you reflect on the fact that, yeah, perfectly solve the sacrifice Donnie Darko make doesn't perfectly solve everything. And, you know, there are, there are, there are pluses and minuses, there are pros and cons. I think that's what it's there for, is a character who gets unearthed, but only in this kind of parallel universe that's collapsing and that won't exist anymore. So we, the audience, get to see something of a character that in the main universe that none of them are aware of. It's just so so clever, because that kind of naturally makes me then think about Richard Kelly's further output, in particular Southland Tales, which you listeners may remember we have watched. I don't know if you have. I really have been quite perverse with my choices of films that we discuss, like I really put you through the ringer before we get to the good stuff. No, but it's just, it's just amazing because we're Southland Tales to give us, to give a quick recap, but to go back and listen to our previous episode on, on black, black check. I think it was a blank check movie was the was the episode we discussed it on, because after Donnie Darko, Richard Kelly was given more funding, like, what's he going to do next? And we get a much a film that. It sort of has some similar themes. And there is like, there is something of the that energy about it. There is the same mix of sci fi and fantasy and surrealism mixed with kind of pop elements. You know, I think about Sarah Michelle gell character and the costume and stuff now, exactly, but it just doesn't hang together. Well. It feels jarring and unnerving, but in this somehow it really works. The same kind of themes and interests are in are in Southland Tales, but it just doesn't all hang together. It's like Donnie Darko was it just all those things that he had in his head and the stories you wanted to tell all just worked, whereas Southland Tales just didn't. But the thing is, reading a bit more about his films filmography is that he's recently said that Donnie Darko, Southland Tales and the box, which was his third film, are all set in the same universe. You can see the box is him trying to course correct. The box is him trying to just do something more mainstream. But again, it's not good. It's not good, but it has a sequence with like portals and water in it. I was watching they can hang on a sec. This is all this Donnie Darko stuff. What's this doing in the box? It's interesting. I feel, I do feel a bit sad about the fact that he couldn't quite work together, or or he or he couldn't just kind of let put that to one side and move on and try something else. I feel like perhaps he got a little too caught up in the Donnie Darko sphere, because when he's talking, I read an interview with him where he talks about how he's been thinking about Donnie Darko for 20 years, even he doesn't understand all of it. And I sort of feel like him having this revelry for this thing that he created might have held him back a little bit from moving on and and and truly creating his next great project. You know, he's talked about wanting to make a sequel, and there was actually a Donnie Darko sequel called S Darko about his sister, which I never saw. I remember my sister watched it because she was also obsessed. On a darker and it's, it sounds terrible. I think it got 13 it's got 13% on Rotten Tomatoes. Richard Kelly had nothing to do with the film because, so he doesn't own the rights to the property. So it's completely disconnected from anything to do with the the Creator. It's just a cash in from, you know, I've not watched it either. It look, it looks terrible. But, you know, having said that, I am quite glad for Richard Kelly's obsession with his debut film, because it made researching this film an absolute dream, because there's so much out there, and I, and I'm and the fact that, as we mentioned, there's you can online read the book that Madam death wrote. And Oh, Grandma death. Grandma death, okay, oh God, we did it again. Yes, grandma death wrote. It's just, it really does add something. And there was a website, right, that Richard Kelly made to go with it, yeah, well, it was like a promotional website. This is back in the days. This is only a couple of years after Blair Witch Project. The Blair Witch Project was the first film where the hype and the promotion for it was all based around the website and the internet, you know, because it played into the found footage thing, The Blair Witch Project. And then we have this one for Donnie Darko, where I can't remember the exact premise, but it's like a mystery that you have to solve. So you go on the website and you click certain links, and you have to try and solve like a puzzle. And part of it is you hear the black box recording that was on the airplane that crashed into donnie's house. So you even hear, so there's audio of that. And then as you work through it, you get, as you kind of answer puzzles, you get to read those pages from grandma deaths book. So they they're like little essentially, when you solve puzzles, you get rewarded with these little fragments. But, and that was a great experience, because, you know, it meant that the true fans have kind of gone to the website, and then you get a little puzzle to solve. I can't remember if I probably had to google how to solve it, but, um, but you work your way through it, and you get, you know, you get to hear a bit of audio. You get rid of a book. It really added to the kind of, because it still didn't fully, it didn't feel like it fully explained everything. It's a bit like, to be, honestly, it's a bit like, if someone explained exactly what's going on in 2001 it's like, it's kind of interesting, but that's not what the film is about. Knowing exactly how it all works doesn't suddenly, I don't know. You don't need to know it to enjoy Donny darkweed. It's more for out of interest, like, it's interesting how what happened, what's really going on in 2001 but that, that isn't what makes two it doesn't make it any better, really, 2001 A Space Odyssey. Just for anyone wondering if James was talking about the year, the year in view. Oh, yeah, sorry, sorry, we, we, I referenced it so much. I just assume everybody know, you know what I'm talking about. Sorry, I'm sure they did. I'm no, no, no, I'm sure they did. I'm sure they did. But yeah, I mean, like, it just, it really, really again, kind of proves the point that Richard Kelly was so, so ahead of his time with this film, to have this idea of of marketing it in this way, and adding so much the lore of the film. And I think that's incredible and super impressive. And it's just, it's a beautiful. Film and and if you haven't watched it, watch it. And if you haven't watched in a while, watch it again. Because that was the other thing I loved watching again. Because part of me was like, is it going to stand up? You know, it's been, I haven't watched it. Most films that you were obsessed with when you're a teenager doesn't, don't quite hold but it absolutely does. It's incredible. Yeah, yeah. I was thinking that as well. I was like, is, you know, is it going to one of these films that, you know, it was good when I was a bit younger, but maybe now. But no, no, it's great. So it's a definitive example of that kind of early noughties American filmmaking, you know, like the aforementioned memento. It turns on shine the Spotless Mind. It was like this kind of little wave we had of modestly budgeted, but really kind of interesting, reality bending films that kind of chopped and changed around with its storytelling. Yeah, all right. Well, thank you all for listening to another episode of groovy movies. Thank you very much, and if you could leave us a like or a review, it all helps get the podcast out to larger audience. So we'll see you next week. Bye, bye. Groovy movies is produced and edited by us, Lily Austin and James Brailsford. And James also produced the theme music. Follow us on Instagram and Tiktok at groovy movies pod, or email us. Groovy moviespod@gmail.com for more information about the films discussed, check out the show notes you.