Review: Requiem for a Dream (2000)

Requiem for a Dream (2000) is a highly acclaimed film, because it gives the viewer an honest and uncensored view into the lives of people who become addicts. The film sheds light on addiction and illustrates to the viewer the many things which can go wrong. The depiction of addiction in Requiem for a Dream (2000) is not the typical presentation, as the characters are not the stereotypical poor, broken-home "worthless" people who become addicts as most addicts are often depicted as. The characters come from various backgrounds, and have different life experiences. The film serves to shed light on the fact that addiction can often spiral out of control, and cause the addict to value the high more than their life, as well as presents the fact that searching for happiness through drugs can often lead to desperation.

In Requiem for a Dream, Harry, his girlfriend Marion, and his friend Tyrone are all Heroin addicts. Harry and Tyrone eventually decide to start dealing drugs in order to make enough money to create the life that they want for themselves. Meanwhile, Harry's mother Sara, a game show addict, receives an anonymous phone call and believes that she will appear on a game show, and becomes consumed with being able to fit into a red dress which represents a happy moment in her life. In order to do so, she visits a doctor who prescribes her diet pills, which she takes four times a day. The pills are actually amphetamines taken three times a day, and one sedative taken at night. She gets used to the drugs and their affect on her, and so she begins to take them more frequently, and a few at a time, and quickly ends up addicted. She eventually winds up in the hospital, and even after treatment, she never returns to the person who she was. Tyrone is caught by the police, and Harry uses most of the money they had made to bail him out. As the money dwindles, Harry and Marion are desperate for money to buy Heroin, so Marion sleeps with her Psychiatrist for money. Harry and Tyrone eventually travel south to Florida, in order to find drugs, and on their way they end up finding out that Harry's arm is severely infected from injecting himself, and go to a hospital where they are both arrested and doctors end up having to amputate Harry's left arm. Tyrone goes through withdrawal while in jail, and Marion ends up selling sex for drugs and gets sucked into the seedy sex world.

The film makes evident that it doesn't take much for a casual drug habit to quickly spiral out of control. In Requiem for a Dream (2000), Sara starts by taking the drugs as prescribed, but slowly ups her dose as the affects wear off, until she becomes addicted. This illustrates the how addictive drugs can be, and how a few extra pills here and there can quickly add up and after a while can become several times higher than the original dose prescribed. As discussed in Levinthal (2010), "drug doses may be increased beyond the level of the prescription in the mistaken idea that if a little is good, more is even better"(p.7). Sara desperately wanted to shed the weight needed to fit into her dress and could very well have taken the extra pills under the same false belief as stated in Levinthal (2010). Sara's story also parallels that of an entertainer in Maté (2009), who said that they began taking pills to control constant pain, and after years of taking the pills, ended up consuming them at frequencies higher than prescribed. "In 1965 they gave me one Percodan that took me through the day. And by '78, I was taking 13 a day, 15 a day" (p.132). In less than a year, Sara went from taking four pills a day, to taking two or three pills at once, sometimes within a few minutes of each other. Unlike the entertainer who was taking prescription pills for more than a decade, Sara became addicted to the point of hallucinating in only several months time, which shows how quickly an addiction can arise. As well, Harry and Tyrone begin searching for drugs to sell and get high on, but the police have cracked down and it's hard to get a hold of drugs, so they find themselves in dangerous situations and eventually end up driving 100s of miles away to find drugs, before they both end up in jail and Harry loses his arm. It is evident how a seemingly "simple" idea, such as buying drugs and selling them for a profit, can encounter problems, and unforeseen events can cause a person to engage in riskier and riskier behaviour, and in effect end up taking a dive to rock bottom. Furthermore, Marion is craving drugs and without drugs and money becomes so desperate that she sleeps with her psychiatrist for money. She is disgusted with herself for having slept for drug money, yet her desperation for heroin takes over once again, and after several days without drugs she ends up calling a guy who trades drugs for sex and gets sucked into the sex world. An addict in Maté (2009), named Madeleine discussed the fact that "Even if you pay them back, they still think you owe them" (p. 19). This is evident in Marion's situation as the man whom she trades sex for drugs in the end insists that she return and makes evident with his stare that she cannot refuse as he believes he did her a "favor", which means that she now owes him. In the end, all four characters end up much worse off than they started off, illustrating that often times a bad situation can always become worse.

For an addict, the drug fix can often become worth more than their own lives, causing them to risk their lives. Sara takes her prescription diet pills as the doctor ordered, however, as she becomes addicted, she dismisses the doctor's orders and begins to increase her pill intake, risking overdose. She loses sense of reality and ends up giving in to her craving for the pills. She dismisses the known fact that taking medication differently than prescribed can be dangerous and even fatal. With every extra pill she takes she is gambling her life. As well, Harry's drug addiction caused him to keep injecting in his obviously infected injection site, which he had been ignoring, putting his life in further danger, and ultimately resulting in amputation. This illustrates Maté's (2009) point that "most will die of ...a massive septicemia contracted through multiple self-injections during a prolonged cocaine run" (p. 16). Harry understands that there is a problem with his arm, however, he ignores it and risks his life, like many addicts in the real world. The fact that he waits until the pain in his arm is excruciatingly unbearable illustrates Maté's (2009) point about addicts being in "poor health and yet so averse to taking care of themselves or even to allowing others to take care of them" (p. 14). Harry's life clearly means nothing next to getting high. In Maté (2009), Kai and Hobo "are so focused on their next hit of cocaine or heroin or "jib"- crystal meth- that self-preservation pales into insignificance" (p. 14) Harry is exhibiting the same behaviour and is a parallel to Kai and Hobo. As well, Marion has traded sex for drugs, risking sexually transmitted diseases and abuse, which put her life at risk, making clear the fact that she values a drug fix more than her own life. Marion is like many women that Maté (2009) has met and who use "oral sex to pay" (p. 18). All of the characters in Requiem for a Dream (2000) engage in classic risk taking behaviour, by putting their next fix above all else, especially their own health and well-being.

Requiem for a Dream (2000) illustrates that addicts can't always turn their lives around, and that searching for happiness though means of drugs can often result in devastation, and cause a person to wind up worse off than they originally were. Tyrone who was a drug addict in the beginning of the film, with the goal of making his mom proud, ends up worse off, as an addict going through withdrawal while in jail for the second time. As well, Harry was happy with Marion and they had hopes of opening a store for Marion to sell her designs but when Harry leaves Marion in New York to find drugs in Florida and ends up losing his arm, it becomes clear that their relationship is most likely over. The hard reality as described in Maté (2009) is that "blood-borne infections are frequent complications of drug use" (p. 79). Harry is a depiction of the addicts who suffer infection from their drug use and end up with irreversible consequences. Harry's leaving for Florida to find drugs is also a parallel to Lane's story, in Crozier (2006), of the man who leaves his wife, kids and home and ends up homeless in Toronto looking for alcohol, before returning only to divorce four months later (p. 9). Marion takes drugs in order to fulfill her addiction, however her desperation to obtain drugs causes her to trade sex for drugs, which then causes her to take drugs even more, in order to forget and to escape from her shameful sexual encounters. This illustrates Maté's (2009) point that "no external remedy improves our condition without, at the same time, making it worse" (p. 99). The drugs cannot "cure" a problem, but only add to a person's problems, because they are left with the same problems that they had to begin with, but are afterwards also left with the problem of a drug addiction and other problems which arose from the addiction. As well, Marion is embodies what is described by Maté (2009) as "the uncomfortable truth that most clients will remain addicts" (p. 12). Of the four characters in the film, Marion is the one who will most likely continue being an addict. Sara original addiction to television and game-shows is what allows to her to become addicted to prescription pills, because the thought of being on a game-show makes her feel alive and consumes her. In order to be on the game-show she takes drugs in order to fit into her red dress, which she dreams she will wear on her game show appearance. Her desperation to live that moment in its fullest causes her to start taking the diet pills in order to lose the weight needed to fit into the dress. She never ends up on the game show, and only ends up hospitalized where she refuses treatment and is eventually given electroshock therapy. Even after a while in the hospital, Sara is only a hollow shell of who she used to be. Although Sara wasn't completely satisfied with her life and the monotony of it, she was at least mentally sane and able to take care of herself. For Sara, "drugs have the power to make the painful tolerable and the humdrum worth living for" (p. 31), as described in Maté (2009). This explains how a woman only looking for a way to lose a few pounds could end up so addicted to prescription pills. Sara is not alone in being hospitalized, as Levinthal(2010) states that "28 percent of drug-related ED visits involved prescription or OTC medications alone" (p. 35). Searching for happiness in drugs can have heartbreaking consequences, as happiness come from within, and a temporary fix cannot resolve or change a permanent state.

Requiem for a Dream (2000) allows the viewer to see the lives of drug addicts from close up and that the drug world is one which rarely affords a person a happy ending. Crozier (2006), Maté (2009) and Levinthal (2010) give the viewer the knowledge to understand the film in more than just a superficial way, and this allows the viewer to understand how realistic many aspects of the film are and how prevalent certain harsh realities are. The film provides the viewer with an understanding of addiction which comes from the fact that the viewer sees with Sara, for example, how an addiction can start, and why some people may become addicted to various substances more easily than other people. The honesty presented in the film allows the viewer to truly see how quickly the shift from taking drugs occasionally to being a full blown addict can occur, and that addiction can occur with television, prescription pills and just about anything. The viewer is also shown the troubled fact that addicts often place a higher value on the drug fix than on their own lives, as well as illustrate to the viewer that attempting to find happiness in drugs can lead to desperation. The film allows the viewer to see that no matter how glamorized drugs and the drug world can sometimes be, the reality is anything but. The simplicity of the depiction of drug addiction in the film is what gets the anti-drug message across, without ever stating, "don't do drugs".

References

Barenholtz, B. (Producer), & Aronofsky, D. (Director). (2000). Requiem for a dream [Motion picture]. Artisan Entertainment.

Crozier, L. & Lane, P. (2006). Addicted: Notes from the Belly of the Beast. Vancouver, Canada: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd.

Levinthal, C F. (2010). "Drugs and Behavior Today". Levinthal, C F. Drugs, Behavior and Modern Society. Sixth ed. Boston, USA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Levinthal, C F. (2010). "Drug-Taking Behavior: The Personal and Social Concerns", C F. Drugs, Behavior and Modern Society. Sixth ed. Boston, USA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Mate, G. (2009). In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction. Toronto, Canada: Random House of Canada Ltd.