Day 027 || Pi

Pi, 1998
Dir. Darren Aronofsky

"Something's going on. It had to do with that number. There's an answer in that number."

Another day, another look at a director's earlier work that I missed. Today is Darren Aronofsky's first film, Pi, which is easily his most unfocused, unrefined, and completely open-ended film, even more so than The Fountain. But whereas I loved The Fountain and was willing to work at it to find meaning and purpose in it, Pi simply didn't engage me and came off as a jumbled homage to David Cronnenberg and David Lynch.

I'll start with the positive. Pi is a very well shot film, set in a grungy New York City with a brilliant black and white filter that's put to great effect. Aronofsky has crafted a beautiful and visually engaging film that accurately and cleverly portrays the paranoia and fear that radiates throughout. Clint Mansell is also on board for the soundtrack, as par with all other Aronofsky films, and it's a good score. Not great, because the trance and techno feel of the music at times doesn't correctly mesh with the mood and atmosphere.

And at times this film becomes grippingly interesting, mostly when the mathematics of numbers are on display. A sense of curiosity and mathematical philosophies are brought up on occasion, and it's in these moments where the lead character, Max, are explaining the Fibinacci sequence, or golden rectangle, that things start to get really intriguing and promising.

The rest of the film doesn't really come together. Maybe the point of the film is to leave the audience in the dark. To keep us guessing what exactly we watched, long after the credits have rolled. But I wasn't engaged with any of the characters, and some of the mathematical jargon kind of flew over my head, and I'm not the average viewer. I happen to think I'm more open minded and tend to dig deeper into films...maybe I just missed something, but it doesn't really seem like there's much to delve into here.

So what we're ultimately left with is a gorgeous and visceral film, that rings hollow through and through. As Aronofsky's first film, it definitely shows where the filmmaker was and is headed, and you can see pieces of his style here, albeit very unrefined and unfocused. It's a promising start, but that's about it.

2 out of 5