The Soundtrack of REQUIEM FOR A DREAM: Portraying a Real-Life Horror
“Sometimes, in life, you must be hurt in order to know, fall in order to grow, and lose in order to gain,because the greatest lesson life gives us usually comes through pain. However, the realisation of such lessons is astonishing”
In the early 2000s, there was an era where every ominous video you came across online featured the same music: Clint Mansell’s Lux Aeterna, originally scored for Darren Aronofsky’s 2000 film Requiem for a Dream. This music has turned into a genre of its own and was used not only in those early YouTube videos but also in film trailers, TV shows, and even video games. Almost everyone was using it, but why?
This music has a magical structure that alters your brain chemistry, but a part of the explanation does include a pinch of “it just works”. Of course, the fact, that it only uses chords and is in a mirror key certainly helps it sound more depressive, and its repetitive progression accordingly makes the song more versatile. But why this song became as big as it is today, cannot be attributed solely to its musical properties; there’s time, people, and even luck behind every success, and nobody can really explain how everything comes together. Nevertheless, what we can do and should be doing is to remember that this score was originally written and used for a particular film— a film that is just as dreadful, if not more.
This is important because music and films go hand in hand. You pick the wrong music and it can ruin a scene by taking away from the intended tone, or by overpowering the visuals and making the whole sequence forceful. In this sense, Lux Aeterna is the perfect example of a score that complements the film; not only is it — and frankly every score in this film—placed in the right scenes at the right tempo, but it is also always at the foreground of the edit, almost functioning as a diegetic element that interacts with the characters and their environment. This makes the music just as noticeable and impactful as the images on screen, increasing the likelihood of having its musical pattern engraved into the minds of the audience. The depressing and frankly degrading nature of both the score and the film only helps with this engraving process.
Embracing this concept from the very start, the film opens up not with a traditional score but rather with the sound of an orchestra tuning, presumably for the requiem that is to come. This tuning happens twice in the film; once here in the beginning, and once before the “fall” chapter— the season, but also because this is when the characters begin to ‘fall’.
Either way, on both occasions, the tuning signals a significant turning point. At first, it prepares the audience for a hopeful takeoff, with every character full of ambition and their addiction yet to fully take control. It is a chapter of development, where both the dreams and the addiction blossom behind the scene. By the second time, the audience hears this tuning, they already know what awaits is a violent crash, where the addiction takes hold of everyone’s life and consumes their dreams with burning fire. It is a chapter of awakening—a harsh reminder that a dream is just a dream, and nobody is made strong enough to fly too close to the Sun.
Lux Aeterna is the central leitmotif of the film that represents the theme of the entire narrative— that the dreams of every character on screen will never come to fruition as long as they are enslaved by their addiction. It Is a literal requiem—a mournful chanting for the dreams that have faded away. The “meltdown” motif serves as an antithesis to Lux Aeterna in that it represents the very alive and real consequences of their addiction.
The score functions as a trigger, conditioning our minds by repeatedly reintroducing a given motif under specific circumstances. A good example of this is found in the interaction between Harry and Marion. Their musical theme is the “Ghost” motif; this melancholic theme is played four times just in the first thirty minutes of the film, loudly announcing its presence and helping the audience link Harry and Marion's relationship with the notes of the score. The “Ghost” theme is then played four more times after that as a direct counterpart to the first four instances; both Harry and Marion are slowly succumbing to their addiction, and their love is becoming the secondary concern. Likewise, the music slightly shifts the tone by incorporating intrusive string sounds, matching the pictures and communicating their declining relationship. When this theme gets played for the last time before the big final, the audience naturally recalls Harry and Marion’s past interactions, producing a weird mix of emotions, starting from nostalgia and heartache all the way to a giant wave of hopelessness. The music in this scene accentuates the journey these characters have taken, and warns of their unstoppable downfall, making the final sequence even more devastating.
We see another great example of effective scoring before the “Meltdown” motif hits the floor and advances the denouement. As the character stands before their tragedy, their unbearable agitation is depicted with the “Tense” motif, a short but nerve-racking piano piece that is entirely made up of minor intervals. However, upon careful inspection, it is revealed that this motif is being played for only three of the four protagonists on the screen. Sara, who is basically in a state of psychosis, is dubbed instead with the “Drea”m motif; The Summer, The Dream. This separates her character from others and distinguishes her as the only person completely out of touch with reality. After all, the “Dream” motif has been used for scenes that generally examine implausible and unrealistic visions of the future. It’s only when the physical world becomes too extreme even for Sara’s broken mind to handle that this motif gets silenced and replaced with the “Meltdown” motif.
That idea in itself is scary, but knowing that the score has only just begun, the viewers intrinsically suppose that the worst is yet to come. And indeed, that’s when all hell breaks loose. The film represents rapidly intercutting pictures in extreme close-ups, reflecting the characters’ isolation and emphasising the chaos of the whole situation. While the problems displayed on the screen are different—ranging from ECT therapy, prostitution and manual labour—the cuts still generate a sense of oneness. For one, the shots are assembled with highlights or vague graphic matches and matching transitions. Harry’s damaged arm is cut to Sara’s arm, framing the scene with hostility; the invasive flashlight held by the doctor is cut to Marion’s face receiving unwanted attention from a crowd of men who are just as invasive if not more; Harry falling to the ground in pain is matched with the POV shot of Sara on a stretcher forecasting his fate; and likewise, the panning shot of the intrusive crowd is matched with the panning shot of the doctors, encouraging the audience to question everyone’s intention.
In addition to the intense music and harsh, horrific scenes that already get you through to the bone, the meltdown theme's conveyance of tragedy is enhanced through the insertion of minor character speech and overlapping sound effects. The repetitive lines are critical; they don't just set the scene, but behave as the key vocal line for this unpleasant harmony, pulling the sounds to the forefront and counterbalancing the intensity of the rapid-fire shots. Whilst layered diegetic sounds such as pen strokes, knockings, doors opening and even the saw blade work in tandem with the non-melodic score playing. The cuts and transitions also speed up and slow down according to what is happening on screen, worsening the confusion and causing the audience unease.
The very last music the audience hears before the film actually ends is Lux Aeterna. This music is the one to close the loop and for a good reason. The minor progression of this music has no melodic direction; consisting of only four primary chords, the score begins with a five-note melody and gets tighter and tighter as it progresses. In essence, the progression of this music itself represents the film as a whole: after all the energy and time spent attempting to resolve the music, it betrays our sweat and tears and ends the same way it has begun. Just like the characters, and just like a dream, we have gone nowhere, and nothing has changed. All there is left for us is this mournful requiem that reminds us of our journey, and of the things that could have been.