Donnie Darko Meaning
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This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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anonymous Oct 25th 2007, 08:35 report
Yeah it is about that. Kinda like the butterfly effect. If Donnie would had lived, he would have taken the lives of about 4 people. His mother, his girlfriend, and Frank. I think his sister already will die, but she might not go on the plane if her brother recently died. So the cost of his life means the life of 3 others are spared. I LOVE DONNIE DARKO!
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sailorguy370 Jun 29th 2008, 22:57 report
I thought that Donnie Darko seemed to be a movie whose purpose was to defile the concreteness of time and space, and also to present reality as an abstract and malleable object. Throughout the movie Donnie travels throughout time and space whether through foreshadowing symbolism, or through his imaginary (or not so imaginary) friend Frank. I think the movie conveys the truth about the inconclusiveness of reality. The movie seems to suggest that multiple realities are taking place all at once, example; Donnie has the choice to either live or die during the airplane crash, and that decision was a fork in the road in determining how Donnie would create reality. Since it possible for him to make either choice, both realities exist at the same time. So Donnie would both be dead and stay alive, but in separate realities. The reason that Donnie was seeing the apparitions and was a social outcast was that he had an acute sense of these seperate alternate realities. This is what Frank may have been, a visitor from a separate reality that he was choosing. Through Donnie's unique power, he was able to live both realities at once.
If you love the movie I would recommend watching the directors cut edition, there are deleted scenes that help define the themes more clearly. -
nicksp13 Apr 14th 2009, 01:46 report
Ok I haven't watched the movie in about a week, so I just went over what was on the top of my head. Here goes.
In my opinion, this movie was about… time travel/God’s big plan. When Donnie met Frank the rabbit, who at the time was dead and only Donnie could see, he was lured out of his house, down the road to talk to the mysterious rabbit. While Frank told Donnie how long the world had left, which in my opinion was because just by Donnie leaving his house to meet with Frank, he had broken what was SUPPOSE to happen, causing everything in the world to be effected.
With Frank allowing Donnie to see things, such as others and his own direction in life, Donnie had the opportunity to defy the direction he was chosen.
(Here comes the time travel)
Frank was a normal kid, but only at the ending of the movie. Throughout the movie, he was a ghost, giving Donnie orders and providing important information.
Donnie was the one who had messed up Frank’s eye, when he shot him after running over and killing his girlfriend near the end of the movie. The end of the world was the world being set to an earlier point, when Frank and Donnie threw everything off, this time involving no disruptions, and having everything happen the way it should have the first time. Donnie being in his room when the jet engine hit. The ending was sad and unexpected, but it seemed as though Donnie’s mom and Donnie’s girlfriend remembered each other before the world ending and being basically reset?
Did they remember each other? Was it just a dramatic stare? That’s what makes the movie great, you don’t know.
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anonymous Jun 14th 2009, 12:46 report
The aim of this film was to show the hidden nature of things. Reality is objective and subjective, but true reality is a whirling wiggly series of lines always moving changing,lawless. We make the laws, but when the laws are broken we are left in a position to see things from infinite angles.
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Paper1 Jul 12th 2009, 20:18 report
The interpretation I've heard is to do with God. In the film God looks away for just a second and as a result Donnie has free will, gets out of bed and doesn't die as God had intended. However by doing so, God had been proved fallible, and therefore not omniscient.
The film continues that God no longer controls the flow of events, as he is no longer all powerful and knowing, and so creation begins to destruct. In a bid to avoid this God manipulates the living and the dead to encourage Donnie to realise his fate.
Towards the end, as the universe destructs, God creates a time portal near the plane to have the engine sucked through, and Donnie realises that in order to prevent the destruction of the universe he must die. -
manamongkings Sep 18th 2009, 22:42 report
I think that the idea of time travel is a red herring. Its used to make the movie appear to have more levels than it has, and subsequently it appears (and is) profound.
The movie is about a boy coming to understand why he must die. Why he has to get killed (by a jet engine) in order for a series of events, which are more tragic, to not take place.
Truly a brilliant movie. -
friendsfreak Nov 16th 2009, 21:16 report
I really don't think this move has anything to do with time travel. Time travel is a science fiction topic, and I really doubt that you could call Donnie Darko a science fiction film. It is a look at the world through the eyes of a teenager.
There are lots of clues suggesting this, like the fact that Donnie lives in a town called Middlesex, or the fact that the song "Mad World," whose original artists say the song portrays the world as seen by a teenager, was redone specifically for the movie.
We are supposed to understand that the story of Donnie Darko merely expands and elaborates a story that surrounds us every day in the confused and depressed minds of teenagers. The story merely gives personification and metaphor to the mental process of a suicidal teen.
Donnie's life continues to spiral downward until he is taken to the point of death, but he evades it at the last second. This mirrors the story of a suicidal teen. However, Donnie is still not out of danger, as immediately winds up face to face with the rabbit, a personification of the darkness and confusion that fills his mind. And the first thing this creation tells him is that his time is limited. He made have escaped death once, but it will come. His universe will, in time, collapse.
As the story progresses, Donnie falls deeper and deeper into confusion and depression. Since Donnie's world reflects his personality, the very fabric of time and space around him begins to distort as well. Finally, Donnie's time expires. He loses touch with reality, sinking below his nihilistic view of life as his world crashes down around him. The parallel universe representing his view of life has died, and Donnie laughs, finally deciding that life is not worth all of the pain and suffering. And with that, Donnie dies. But even his death contributes to the theme. The plane engine falls on him because of the portal that sprang from his the parallel universe that represents his mind. So in the end, Donnie is killed, crushed beneath his own cynical view of the world. -
Andi Mar 18th 2010, 12:44 report
I think its an excellent piece into the mind of a schizophrenic. The fact that Donnie is a sleepwalker is symbolic of 'the splitting of the mind' in schizophrenia. It's when Donnie splits, he meets Frank who tells him the world is going to end as well as 'show' to him that all the deeper mysteries in life that Donnie has been pondering (i.e. the existence of God, and the space/time continum,) are valid and urges him to follow the signs when he 'wakes up'.
Throughout the movie Donnie remains in the limbo between his two minds, receiving valid information from both realities making them coincide. This duality is overwhelming for Donnie as you can see from the sessions with his psychiatrist(false god), who believes that Donnie is simply schizo and has convinced Donnie himself that he is schizo. This label that has been put on Donnie actually contributes to his confusion, anger and unhappiness. If he is what we call schizophrenic then is this connection he has with Frank (God) false therefore, there is no God? Or, if it is real then could everyone else be 'crazy' and he has to accept his role and protect them from themselves?
Donnie chooses to believe the latter, after his shrink tells him that she's been prescribing him a placebo (her facing the fact that she herself is not God and therefore cannot tell him if his experiences are real or not)And neither can we.
What ties it all together is the end, when all the main characters experience this alternate reality themselves as their dreams. Everything that happened, the flood, the fire the shootings all took place in a collective 'dream' and when shaking those characters to their core, making them question the path their live are taking for example at the end when Frank (the boy) 'dreams' that he gets shot because of the Halloween costume he has designed for himself, and how Patrick's character wakes up in tears probably happy that it was all a 'dream' and he has time to stop molesting little kids etc etc...Finally I believe the jet engine is also symbolic and Donnie really shoots himself in the head. -
anonymous Apr 25th 2010, 14:46 report
I think that Donnie Darko has taken a similar interpretation of the film "Jakobs Ladder...
Donnie dies at the start of the film by the air plane jet that falls on him in his sleep,the air plane component representing a "Engine for Life".
The rest of the film is Donnie trying to come to terms with dying, the rabbit is used as a symbol for "Death" and that a constant reminder that you can never escape him so live your dreams as you intend before he (the rabbit) comes for you.
The time travel and stuff is there to show Donnie trying to create his own world to prove to himself that he is alive, although at the end he realises that the world he created is horrible (his girlfriend dies) and that he would rather be with her... thus coming to terms that he must die. -
This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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solidsnake5EEL3 Sep 3rd 2010, 09:31 report
I believe the movie is filled with intense symbolism and metaphors or either this is how I interpreted the movie. The videos the teacher played in class about "controlling fear" is very important. Our lives are controlled by fear. Fear of being rejected, judged, failing, being alone, being lied to, dying etc. They mention love being the opposite to fear. We all know Donnie lives his life in fear as he mentions in therapy he doesn't want to be alone. At the end of the movie he willingly sacrifices his own life for others which is an act of love, thus became at peace at dying alone because he chose love and all his fears fell. Of course like Donnie mentioned in class, there are many things to account for between the duality love and fear.
Going back to the video, there appears a large woman who mentions she lived her life in fear until she looked in the mirror and saw her "ego reflection". A symbol for self introspection. We need to look at ourselves honesty without judgment to truly love ourselves unconditionally then we can start to love others without condition. That also means diving deep into our dark pasts where we fear to tread and feel the pain which has been inflicted on us and tells our ego we are worthless, ugly, stupid, disgusting etc. The shame we hide from ourselves or don't even know exist because we too have hurt and intended to hurt so many others.
When Donnie and his love interest are showing the class an invention which presents peaceful and beautiful images to a child when he/she sleeps, the teacher suggests that maybe the child needs "darkness" to develop. We need to confront our ego and let out what it feels so we can kill it and start over again. Donnie interprets a passage from the book they read in class which he suggests, destruction makes room for creation. As in destruction of the ego leads to rebirth. Destruction of the dark past which we have left unfinished because we were too scared to confront what we really felt. Despite whether or not what we feel or felt is true facts does not matter. It is the process of letting our feelings live out in the open. Otherwise it stays in our subconscious and therefor our inner world reflects our outer world. Just like the evil rabbit which constantly appears before Donnie during the movie. The evil rabbit can also be a symbol for the devil (ego) and also Donnie's inner torment and distortion of the world reflecting outwards.
At the end of the movie, Donnie gets in the car and looks at his dead girlfriend as we hear what she said earlier in the movie, "what if we could go back in time and replace all our bad memories with good ones". The destruction of past memories and feelings. The pain which blinds and confuses us and stops us from freely loving others. We have the power to destroy all our pain and we don't even need a time machine to do that.
What I interpreted as Donnie escaped death at the beginning of the movie and how he ended up dying anyways was also a symbol for synchrony and fate. As the song "Killing Moon" goes at the start of the movie "Fate, up against your will". The liquid cylinder which flows out of Donnie's chest shows how everyone's life path is premeditated. Coincidences are not coincidences but the act of synchrony and Donnie is aware of this as he uses the book "Philosophy of Time" as a guide. He knew he was suppose to find it and I am sure we have all experienced the same thing. The unconscious is very powerful and whatever pain and hatred we have in there is only blinding us. As Sigmund Freud said "until you make the unconscious conscious, it will guide you and you will call it fate".
As the teacher mentioned, we need pain and darkness to develop and grow as a person. To become independent and whole. As we look deep into ourselves, at our dark side and our good side too. We must not divide them into negative or positive. We must escape the world of duality. We have to look at them openly and honestly without judgment. That is unconditional love towards ourselves. And to do this is not always easy. But if it wasn't easy then we would have nothing to gain. And taking off our mask and showing our real selves to someone is risky because unfortunately, a lot of people naturally like to judge, only because they are in the same position as us. We need to choose carefully who we shows our selves too. Let's face it, not many of us likes the feeling of becoming vulnerable but it is something we have to feel. To feel truly human and alive. Because if we never take off our mask, we will sadly lose ourselves in this world and not even realize it.
Maybe the ending of the world in Donnie Darko was not physically the end of the world. But the end of a world. His world. To start over again. Ending is beginning. Destruction leads to creation. Donnie's therapist speaks the words into his ears "if the world were to end, if the sky were to open up, there would be no rule, no law, it would just be you and him". Who is him? God? And is no rule and no law a meaning of liberation? Peace out everyone
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anonymous Sep 11th 2010, 12:09 report
It's all very easy. See Donnie can see the future. If he lives many people will die so he decides to stay in his bed and die and the movie goes on to show everyone still alive.
Would you give your life for other people? We can get way deeper into the movie but I think that's the best cut and dry way to explain this film. -
anonymous Jan 19th 2011, 18:30 report
I think one of the key themes of the film is the isolation that comes with being gifted or different. It's suggested that Donnie acquires supernatural powers such as the ability to conjure fire and water, extreme strength, etc. But on a more prosaic level it is implied throughout the film that he is generally brighter and more perceptive that everyone else (eg. reference to his 'intimidating' SAT scores). This greatness doesn't bring Donnie Darko any happiness, in fact the exceptional level of insight which he has into the human condition appears to have made him quite mentally ill. All his personal relationships appear to be either fractious (parents and sisters) or superficial and unsatisfying (his much less intelligent friends whom he appears to be quite weary of). In the director's cut of the film there is a scene where Donnie's father effectively tells him that, throughout his life, the fact of being gifted will cause him to frighten and alienate people. But despite all this he forges a deep and genuine connection with Gretchen, and ultimately sacrifices his own life to save her. So perhaps the film is about the redemptive power of love. Or on a more pessimistic reading - given that Donnie and Gretchen fall in love in the unsustainable tangent universe - perhaps its about the transience of true love.
Either way its a very moving and thought provoking film. -
anonymous Jan 23rd 2011, 06:37 report
I think this movie is an analogy for the aircraft industry and how unsafe they make it for all of us.
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anonymous Mar 7th 2011, 19:48 report
Donnie Darko is my favourite movie.
It's one of those cult movies which polarizes it viewers into 'not getting it'/hating it or absolutely loving it. I think, no matter which way you analyze it, the movie wasn't made to be analysed. Anything you want to see, you'll see it.
Apparently its an existentialist movie. And I suggest that if you dont know what that means -google it. I have an existentialist perspective and i guess thats why i love the movie so much.
My take on the movie is that its not so much about time travel or science - you are being too literal. I only understood what its point was at the end where Gary Jules' 'Mad World' plays. Listen to the lyrics of the song carefully and google existentialism. I think the song is the key in understanding the overall purpose. Not many movies do that. -
anonymous Mar 13th 2011, 03:45 report
all around me are familiar faces... I have heard all these interpretations many times before, yet... I feel that none of them quite encapsulates the message.
We see a few things, old lady death (OLD), his girlfriend, frank, his family and the motivational speaker (MS).
Obviously the film isn't about sacrifice, as, with Donnie dead, the porno dungeon is never found and countless more children would be raped or assaulted due to this. This is an important part of the film, or else it would not have been such a sizable chunk.
OLD was always waiting for something, which only arrived after Donnie died. his GF never knew him, and his entire family was devastated tremendously.
Think about this now, do the benefits (the saving of two lives and delivery of some item) justify all of this misery (the sexual assaults and devastation)?
That is, would you rather have one person die, or several people be raped by a "trusted" individual? Especially when the individual is so famous, so widespread, as Swazye was...
I don't recall what my view on the film was... it became muddled amongst the other interpretations here, but still... I know that it was different... -
anonymous Jun 14th 2011, 02:51 report
There are a lot of scenes in the movie where the characters say things that are very blunt or unrealistic. Many exaggerated scenes. A few examples: When Donnie walks his future girlfriend home and she voluntarily tells him about her parents, when the teacher says "sit next to the boy you think is the cutest", and the most subtle yet extreme one when Donnies parents are eating together and his mom says to his dad "I want a divorce". It seems to have the characters just say what they are thinking without hesitation. It's like a world where every character is brutally honest.
It also seems as if every character plays an exaggerated stereotypical role. Donnies dad is the subtly proud father when Donnie does something rebellious, the crazy principle lady, the young down to earth teacher, donnies sister being proud of donnies crazy acts, etc. The movie seems to emphasize the stereotypical aspects of these characters which adds an interesting flavor to the movie. It really does a good job of showing how shallow the old teacher lady is and how she is so selfish etc.
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This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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anonymous Sep 11th 2011, 01:58 report
The movie starts in a tangent world and the bunny Donnie sees knows him that's the kid that died in the end so it's the second life that he's living and the dead frank is guiding him to make everything go back to reality and Donnie makes time go normal in the end saving everyone and thats why Donnie laughs when he ask the bunny what happen to his eye because it happen before so now Donnie let's the engine crash into the room . It is about time travel and how things are premeditated, paradox's and how one effect can change another . Everyone is open in this tangent universe Gretchen talking about her parents the teach the kids being mean the guy who molest kids
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