Requiem for a Dream (2000), directed by Darren Aronofsky and starring Ellen Burstyn (VIDEO)

Darren Aronofsky’s unsparing adaptation of Hubert Selby Jr.’s rough-edged tale of drug addiction finds seedy poetry in its Brooklyn locales: Brighton Beach has seldom seemed so hellishly sunbaked, Coney Island so unbearably decrepit and the Atlantic Ocean—an alluring nirvana—so entirely out of reach.—Keith Uhlich

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Watch the trailer for Requiem for a Dream

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