Through A Glass, Darko

Cult classic Donnie Darko is a complex mix of science fiction, suspense thriller and doomsday tale with a comic book-like aesthetic. Donnie (Jake Gyllenhaal) is your ordinary high school boy with the ordinary adolescent anxieties — he also has a history of mental illness and violent tendencies. When a hallucinatory monster-cum-Armageddon prophet in an Easter bunny costume begins visiting Donnie and sharing information about time travel, things get a touch weird. Director Richard Kelly's original cut of the film is heralded by fans and critics as haunting, beautiful, troubling and anything but ordinary. With an additional twenty minutes of footage and an altered musical selection, Kelly's 2004 "director's cut" version of the film makes for an altogether different cinematic experience. The expanded Donnie Darko screens at the Tivoli Theatre (6350 Delmar Boulevard, University City; 314-995-6270 or www.landmarktheatres.com) at midnight on Friday and Saturday (July 31 and August 1) as part of the Tivoli's Reel Late series. Tickets are $7.
Fri., July 31; Sat., Aug. 1, 2009