Requiem For A Dream/PI (Two Pack)

Starring:Artisan DVD
Studio: Lions Gate
Product Type: DVD

Editorial Review:
Amazon.com
Requiem for a Dream
Employing shock techniques and sound design in a relentless sensory assault, Requiem for a Dream is about nothing less than the systematic destruction of hope. Based on the novel by Hubert Selby Jr., and adapted by Selby and director Darren Aronofsky, this is undoubtedly one of the most effective films ever made about the experience of drug addiction (both euphoric and nightmarish), and few would deny that Aronofsky, in following his breakthrough film Pi, has pushed the medium to a disturbing extreme, thrusting conventional narrative into a panic zone of traumatized psyches and bodies pushed to the furthest boundaries of chemical tolerance. It's too easy to call this a cautionary tale; it's a guided tour through hell, with Aronofsky as our bold and ruthless host. The film focuses on a quartet of doomed souls, but it's Ellen Burstyn--in a raw and bravely triumphant performance--who most desperately embodies the downward spiral of drug abuse. As lonely widow Sara Goldfarb, she invests all of her dreams in an absurd self-help TV game show, jolting her bloodstream with diet pills and coffee while her son Harry (Jared Leto) shoots heroin with his best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans) and slumming girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connelly). They're careening toward madness at varying speeds, and Aronofsky tracks this gloomy process by endlessly repeating the imagery of their deadly routines. Tormented by her dietary regime, Sara even imagines a carnivorous refrigerator in one of the film's most memorable scenes. And yet... does any of this have a point? Is Aronofsky telling us anything that any sane person doesn't already know? Requiem for a Dream is a noteworthy film, but watching it twice would qualify as masochistic behavior. --Jeff Shannon

Pi
Patterns exist everywhere: in nature, in science, in religion, in business. Max Cohen (played hauntingly by Sean Gullette) is a mathematician searching for these patterns in everything. Yet, he's not the only one, and everyone from Wall Street investors, looking to break the market, to Hasidic Jews, searching for the 216-digit number that reveals the true name of God, are trying to get their hands on Max. This dark, low-budget film was shot in black and white by director Darren Aronofsky. With eerie music, voice-overs, and overt symbolism enhancing the somber mood, Aronofsky has created a disturbing look at the world. Max is deeply paranoid, holed up in his apartment with his computer Euclid, obsessively studying chaos theory. Blinding headaches and hallucinogenic visions only feed his paranoia as he attempts to remain aloof from the world, venturing out only to meet his mentor, Sol Robeson (Mark Margolis), who for some mysterious reason feels Max should take a break from his research. This movie is complex--occasionally too complex--but the psychological drama and the loose sci-fi elements make this a worthwhile, albeit consuming, watch. Pi won the Director's Award at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival. --Jenny Brown
Description
REQUIEM FOR A DREAM: Darren Aronofsky follows up his acclaimed debut Pi with this gritty emotionally charged film set amidst the abandoned beaches and faded glory of Coney Island, Brooklyn. Based upon the novel by celebrated author Hubert Selby Jr., the story intricately links the lives of a lonely widowed mother (Academy Award (r) Winner Ellen Burstyn*), her son Harry (Jared Leto), his beautiful girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connelly) and his best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans). REQUIEM FOR A DREAM is a hypnotic tale of four human beings each pursuing their vision of happiness. Even as everything begins to fall apart, they refuse to let go, plummeting with their dreams into a nightmarish, gut-wrenching freefall. *1975 Best Actress, Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore

PI: A brilliant mathematician teeters on the brink of insanity as he searches for an elusive numerical code in this critically acclaimed, sci-fi thriller!

Amazon.com

Requiem for a Dream
Employing shock techniques and sound design in a relentless sensory assault, Requiem for a Dream is about nothing less than the systematic destruction of hope. Based on the novel by Hubert Selby Jr., and adapted by Selby and director Darren Aronofsky, this is undoubtedly one of the most effective films ever made about the experience of drug addiction (both euphoric and nightmarish), and few would deny that Aronofsky, in following his breakthrough film Pi, has pushed the medium to a disturbing extreme, thrusting conventional narrative into a panic zone of traumatized psyches and bodies pushed to the furthest boundaries of chemical tolerance. It's too easy to call this a cautionary tale; it's a guided tour through hell, with Aronofsky as our bold and ruthless host. The film focuses on a quartet of doomed souls, but it's Ellen Burstyn--in a raw and bravely triumphant performance--who most desperately embodies the downward spiral of drug abuse. As lonely widow Sara Goldfarb, she invests all of her dreams in an absurd self-help TV game show, jolting her bloodstream with diet pills and coffee while her son Harry (Jared Leto) shoots heroin with his best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans) and slumming girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connelly). They're careening toward madness at varying speeds, and Aronofsky tracks this gloomy process by endlessly repeating the imagery of their deadly routines. Tormented by her dietary regime, Sara even imagines a carnivorous refrigerator in one of the film's most memorable scenes. And yet... does any of this have a point? Is Aronofsky telling us anything that any sane person doesn't already know? Requiem for a Dream is a noteworthy film, but watching it twice would qualify as masochistic behavior. --Jeff Shannon

Description

REQUIEM FOR A DREAM: Darren Aronofsky follows up his acclaimed debut Pi with this gritty emotionally charged film set amidst the abandoned beaches and faded glory of Coney Island, Brooklyn. Based upon the novel by celebrated author Hubert Selby Jr., the story intricately links the lives of a lonely widowed mother (Academy Award (r) Winner Ellen Burstyn*), her son Harry (Jared Leto), his beautiful girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connelly) and his best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans). REQUIEM FOR A DREAM is a hypnotic tale of four human beings each pursuing their vision of happiness. Even as everything begins to fall apart, they refuse to let go, plummeting with their dreams into a nightmarish, gut-wrenching freefall. *1975 Best Actress, Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore

PI: A brilliant mathematician teeters on the brink of insanity as he searches for an elusive numerical code in this critically acclaimed, sci-fi thriller!

Customer Reviews:

Trippy.......2007-06-19

Aronofsky is brilliant when it comes to creating a film from the perspective of the weakened human state.

Meeker Review.......2007-05-12

I really liked requiem for a dream but I never watched pi. Requiem for a dreams a trippy movie but its still good.

Pi and Requiem for a dream.......2007-01-09

Great deal!

Requiem for a dream is probably one of my favorite movies. I love the directors work, as well as in PI. If you enjoy movies for what they are, I suggest you get this pack. Like I said, best deal you are going to find!

Requiem For A Dream/ PI (Two Pack).......2007-01-04

Requiem For A Dream is pretty messed up. But that's kinda what makes it such a great movie because it shows two kids' lives just falling apart because of drug addiction and it's presented in a way that makes the viewer feel like they are getting a little wacked out too as the movie progresses. It's definitely not a family movie, but there is solid acting and stellar directing that make this film a must have for anyone who doesn't mind a dark, but entertaining movie.

Pi is good too. It's a little more "artsy" than RFAD, i.e. it's in black and white and there is a heavy emphasis on character development, so the movie doesn't have a whole lot of action, but it does deliver when it counts. The whole plot is just an interesting idea and it kept me intrigued the whole time. I'm not sure if this is one I would watch over and over though. Oh yeah, and the part with the brain on the stairs? I heard that it was actually a real brain...

Just say no to the descent of debauchery.......2006-08-16

A raw look at the rapid descent of drug addiction and the seedy life it inspires. Four people are trapped by their very own vices as the demon of addiction destroys everything they know. Very accurate rendition of how dark the fall can be. I agree with another reviewer who says both addicts and non-addicts alike should see this film. Nothing destroys a life more than addiction. From a junk-food obsessed widow, a heroin shooting son who loses his arm, an arrest in Florida for possession, and a woman's fall into the control of a dealer. A true to life account of just how low one can go.

Average customer rating:

Two Movies for Under $15? This Must be a Dream
We don't give a s#!t about you
Only if this is the Uncut and unblurred out versions
wow! a two-pack for under $20?!

Requiem for a Dream & Pi
Starring: Requiem for a Dream , and Pi
Manufacturer: Lions Gate
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

DVDs Under $9.99 | Today's Deals in DVD | Special Features | DVD | Video

( R ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video

The Fountain (Widescreen Edition)
Pan's Labyrinth (New Line Two-Disc Platinum Series)
Children of Men (Widescreen Edition)
Sublime (Unrated Edition)
Stranger Than Fiction

ASIN: B000MEYKD2
Release Date: 2007-03-28

Description

PI - A paranoid mathematician searches for a key number that will unlock the universal patterns found in nature. REQUIEM FOR A DREAM - A hypnotic tale of four human beings doing their best to succeed in the world, but failing miserably. Four people get hooked on various drugs. Despite their aspirations of greatness, they succumb to their addictions. Watching the addicts spiral out of control, we bear witness to the dirtiest, ugliest portions of the underworld addicts reside in.

Customer Reviews:

Two Movies for Under $15? This Must be a Dream.......2007-06-09

Wait a minute, it's not a dream...it's the "Darren Aronofsky Collection"! If you're a fan of either film, this collection is a bargain. And, yes, the "Requiem for a Dream" version included here is the UNRATED DIRECTOR'S CUT. That's right: No blurred images. You won't be disappointed.

We don't give a s#!t about you.......2007-05-13

A 'Requiem for a Dream' is about both a mother and son losing sight of their dreams. They get pulled under by the pleasant advances of their addictions, and they forget who they once were. It is a beautiful portrayal on others' reflections of reality at large. It gives you a chance to put your feet in other peoples shoes and experience a 'dose' of the agony they face on a daily basis. All of this so you can reflect their experience through your memory and perception without living in their own manufactured hell. After seeing this movie I felt as if I had a better understanding of life. I could see how we are all like moths to the flame, and happy in our own sympathetically imagined worlds. This movie shows how a person can lose sight of their goals, if they stumble in their own addictions that only give them temporary happiness and release.

'Pi' on the other hand is about a man who stumbles on the definition of God. Max (main character) is an excessively private man that eats pain pills like they are candy, and studies the nature of the stock market from the privacy of his own home. He is also a whiz with numbers and computers. Although, he is very self righteous and doesn't like the attention that he gets from any one else. After he predicts a couple stock standings, his computer crashes and acts as if it had a mind of its own. Later on he finds out that his computer was trying to communicate with him, but he gets attacked before he can make any good use of it.

Both of these movies are crafted very well, and give you the chance to understand the world through another persons eyes. Beware with these movies though, because they will bring you down if you don't watch them with the right frame of mind. These movies were made so you don't unknowingly fall into their slice of hell at full speed without any attempt to put your brakes on. It's a sad life when you fall into your own addictions and blindly press on as if you didn't have a care in the world. Every one is hooked on their own kind of medicine. Whether it is anti-depressants, TV, books, or sports everyone defines and traps themselves by what they can't live without. Although, some addictions are more healthy and fluid in order to mesh better with the dynamics of all life. You just have to be able to identify the hinges as they are, and use control when the time is right, so your sobriety stays on top of things. And these movies were made as a demonstration of that.

Only if this is the Uncut and unblurred out versions.......2007-03-13

We need to know about this pairing..I have purchased Requiem for a Dream 2 times and each time it was listed as uncut and unedited and not rated and all the drug sceneces were blurred out, also all graphic images were blurred or missing also...Beware that these may be edited even though they say they are unrated....The cut up versions really bite....

wow! a two-pack for under $20?!.......2007-03-13

Both these films are awesome,and worth the price! I'd gladly pay $20 for EACH of these! If you like these look into getting the film "The Fountain" by the same director;it's equally as awesome!

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