Requiem for a Dream

A closer look at the story

Requiem for a Dream follows four people from Coney Island whose dreams crumble as their addictions take hold. Young Harry Goldfarb has only one aim in life: getting more drugs. His mother, Sara, is lonely and without hope, kept going only by her favourite television quiz show. The gulf between mother and son grows wider by the day. Then Sara learns that she has been picked to appear on the programme. From that moment her single obsession is squeezing into the red dress she dreams of wearing on air, and to manage it she starts taking diet pills. Harry and those around him chase their own longings too, each sinking so deep that none can see where their addiction is dragging them. Darren Aronofsky directed this 102-minute drama from 2000, adapted from Hubert Selby Jr.'s novel, which the two men scripted together. Ellen Burstyn plays Sara, Jared Leto plays Harry, Jennifer Connelly plays Marion and Marlon Wayans plays Tyrone. Its unflinching portrayal of addiction makes it strictly adult viewing.