Donnie Darko (2001)

Richard Kelly wrote an amazing story, perfectly interpreted the same and presented it in the finest way possible. Donnie Darko is a sci-fi drama with an amazing storyline. I was pretty fascinated by Jake Gyllenhaal's acting. He was perfect for the role and he played the character of Donnie very convincingly. This movie is an explicit depiction of surrealism playing with the extreme possibilities of scientific facts not to forget a fine performance by Jake Gyllenhaal and the hero he gets to be, setting things right. Jake plays the role of a kid who has been chosen to maintain the time continuum by placing an artifact ( jet engine ) back into it's actual time.

The story begins on October 1,1988. The intro manifests Donnie waking up at a hill-side as he has been sleep walking and he returns home smiling that suggests he is aware of the things that have been happening.He creates an imaginary friend Frank-Bunny who however turns out to be a related character in the movie as 'The manipulated dead'. On October 2nd a jet engine crashes in his room although his sleep walking habits or here Frank-Bunny saves his life. The jet engine that had crashed in his room was actually the one from October 30th which had been time-corrupted and ends up in the past. All the events from thereon turn out to be happening in a different universe called Tangent universe. Now Donnie is supposed to set things right with the assistance of a wormhole that is supposed to take the jet engine back to where it came from i.e. 30th October. The moment that would happen the time would reset and things would go on normally as in present universe albeit that would come with a cost.

The characters in the story are well depicted. Patrick Swayze plays a writer who is well demolished by Jake by his arrogant comments as his theories according to Jake were pathetic. Maggie Gyllenhaal plays Jake's sister. Daveigh Chase is his little sister who is a dancing enthusiast. Drew Barrymore plays the English teacher who happens to be the only sane being according to Jake in the movie.


Everyone was scared by the 'thoughtful' Darko. His quest provides him with the knowledge about wormholes, time travel, etc. which ultimately elucidates him the thing that he was supposed to do albeit well assisted by the book 'The philosophy of time travel' written by the character Roberta Sparrow or Grandma Death as Donnie used to call her.

The movie is quite surreal and there are a million possible explanations as per the events suggested in the movie. I'd rather go with the one I fathomed. I watch this flick again and again as every time I do, something important that I might have probably skipped pops up and bingo! a new mystery gets unravelled. I'd recommend only the sci-fi enthusiasts to go for it coz those expecting a lot of action in the movie are sure to be disappointed. I personally liked the movie very much and would rate the movie an 8 on 10.