‘Black Swan’:
Review of Scheme, Mode, and Requirements
Black Swan, directed by Darren Aronofsky in 2010, deals with the theme of ‘Perfectionism’ in a suspenseful way. The film is shot through the eyes of the character Nina Sayers (Natalie Portman)
is explained. Nina is a 28-year-old ballerina living in New York. He lives with his mother, Erica, and has an intertwined relationship where his mother takes care of him, making decisions for him.
At the ballet school where Nina dances, it is announced that a new interpretation of the ballet Swan Lake will take the stage next season. In this new interpretation, it is decided that the same ballerina will play the pure, innocent, fragile White Swan and the passionate, assertive and free Black Swan. Nina gets very excited for the role and auditions. The environment at the ballet school, on the other hand, is very competitive. At the beginning of the movie, it becomes clear that the head ballerina Beth Macintyre, who has been working there for years, will retire and who will take her place is on the agenda. Thomas Leroy, who is the director of Swan Lake, frequently criticizes Nina.
is found, tries to provoke him. According to Thomas, although Nina dances the White Swan very well due to her ‘obsession with perfection’, she is unable to provide the lust, spontaneity, surrender and self-revelation necessary for the Black Swan. On the other hand, Lily, who later joined Nina’s dance company, is friendly to Nina, but the director’s comparisons of Lily with Nina and Nina’s statements that she should take Lily as an example for Black Swan increase the pressure on Nina. As the show day approaches, Nina begins to work harder, internalizing Black Swan even more. In the movie, the audition for Nina and the subsequent preparation for the show is a process in which many of her schemas are triggered and she responds to these schemas with maladaptive coping modes, which results in her mental health deteriorating. Although Nina’s psychiatric diagnosis is not reported, there are signs of psychosis, paranoid schizophrenia, anxiety and eating disorders. We see various symptoms such as visual and auditory hallucinations, beliefs that show a disconnection from reality, aggressive behaviors, restricting eating and vomiting behaviors, and physical harm to self and others. If we evaluate in terms of perfectionism, although the most effective schemas in Nina seem to be High Standards, Status Seeking and Flawlessness, we can observe that she has various schemas such as Emotion Suppression, Addiction, Intimacy, Submissiveness, Social Isolation, Skepticism/Distrust, Punishment. By looking at Nina’s thoughts and information about the past throughout the movie, we understand that there are some unmet basic emotional needs that result in the formation of these schemas. We can list these needs as love, unconditional acceptance, autonomy, self-expression, spontaneity and play. He says his remaining successes are insignificant unless the High Standards scheme is the best. We see that Nina generally deals with this scheme in a resigned way, meaning she puts in a serious effort to be the best. However, we can also think of this scheme as an overcompensation of the Imperfection scheme. We can also interpret her not looking at the results as Avoidance, as she guessed that the Swan Queen was not selected when the results of the auditions were announced.
We see that he takes comments very seriously, makes extra efforts to get their approval and tries not to go beyond their approval. He also idealizes the main ballet dancer Beth, whom he sees as ‘perfect’. He steals and uses Beth’s personal belongings to become like Beth, whom he sees in ‘high status’ again. She tries to emulate him as much as she can.
Nina may have felt that she could not get enough love from her mother if she did not succeed because she often received messages from her mother that she had to be the best from a young age and that ballet was her only priority. We also learn in the movie that Erica left her career because she gave birth to Nina. This may have caused Nina to develop beliefs that can lay the foundations of her Imperfection schema, such as seeing herself as an excess that negatively affected her mother’s life, feeling that her existence is a mistake or a burden, and thinking that she is not valuable. On the other hand, the fact that her mother attributed her dissatisfaction to her lack of a successful career may have developed the belief that “I can only be happy if I am successful” in Nina. Erica’s expectation from her daughter is to focus only on ballet, reach the highest point possible there and lead a life accordingly. She believes that for this, there should be no sociability, romantic relationships, entertainment, hobbies. Nina’s needs for bonding, spontaneity and play have probably been ignored since childhood for this reason.
Apart from her relationship with her mother, Nina’s work is one where perfectionism is common and reinforces it (Anshel, 2004). Predominantly in ballerinas or dancers
Although there is no research on the schemas seen yet, it is found that those who have professional ballet careers have perfectionism and related performance anxiety and low self-confidence.
There are studies that reveal this (Nordin-Bates, Cumming, Aways, & Sharp, 2011). In fact, in connection with this, the rates of anorexia nervosa in ballet dancers are higher than the normal population. Nina’s family relationships, temperament and genetic predisposition to psychosis may have greatly influenced the situation to reach such a serious point. But it is also possible that the ballet training he went through contributed to the formation of the schemes in such a profound way. Because the ballet industry is an area where competition is high and there are almost unrealistic expectations about the body and its capacities. Having to be left at an early age, knowing that he has limited time, can increase this pressure because it pushes the limits of the body.
Nina’s emotional suppression, submissiveness, and dependency schemas in Nina, whose self-expression and autonomy needs are hindered by her mother, are trying to achieve the desired performance in Black Swan.
one of the hindering factors. Until then Avoidance with the Emotion Suppression scheme; Having dealt with Submissiveness and Obedient Submissive modes, Nina now expresses her feelings for herself.
When expected to show desire, express anger, and be assertive, they have difficulties. Because what he knows and is used to is ignoring his own feelings and needs and acting ‘harmoniously’. Nina in the movie
In the scene where she masturbates and enjoys, the fact that she later realizes that her mother is sleeping there and panics seems to sum up all the situations in which Nina left herself and had fun. Even though her mother is not physically present, she is always present in Nina’s mind in a criticizing, accusing form, preventing her from enjoying herself. It does not allow the Happy Child mode to appear. Although Nina’s Success-Oriented Demanding Parent mode wants her to make Black Swan ‘perfectly’, we can say that it is this mode that actually prevents it. Until then, the Demanding Parent had told Nina what kind of person to be, what to do and what not to do. Flawless, graceful, soft, delicate and controlled were the features that this mod found ‘right’. But Black Swan’s traits of being passionate and flowing, letting go, fun, spontaneity, freedom were the needs the Demanding Parent had blocked in Nina up to that point. Demanding Parent mod in this case, guilt when Nina acts like a Black Swan; When he acted like a White Swan, he revealed incompetence. This actually shows just how conflicting messages the Demanding Parent mode can deliver. It is not possible to satisfy the Demanding Parent, that is, to be ‘perfect’.
All these external expectations and pressures show us that Nina, whom we watched in adulthood, now applies these pressures to herself. Nina’s Success-Oriented Demanding Parent
When her mode is not satisfied, for example, when she returns home from the audition with negative feedback, she switches to Hurt Child mode with feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness. However, after a short time, I came to terms with these feelings.
overcompensation modes come into play. Nina breaks away from the real needs of the Hurt Child mode and shifts her focus to excellence and achievement. Actually Hurt
Child mode’s needs to be loved, cared and accepted, to feel adequate as it is, cannot be answered, while the need for spontaneity and play is completely thrown aside.
Nina’s Demanding Parent has a very powerful ‘Perfectionist Overcontroller’ mod that works under her control. This mode is an overcompensation that is often seen especially in eating disorders.
mode. This mode causes Nina to work from early morning until late at night until the show, even if she feels pain and pain, she endures it and continues to rehearse. This overcompensation mode, brought about by the internal pressure of the Demanding Parent mode, prevents many of Nina’s needs from being met. Physical needs such as nutrition and sleep in order to be more perfect
restricts. When she wins the audition, she won’t even let her eat cake to celebrate. Even after the day before the show, when Nina’s mental health turned quite negative, she somehow got up and
compels him to perform. Working, making an effort to be successful in the field, showing improvement in the parts where it is missing is something that the Healthy Adult mode will do as well. However, we can understand from the fact that Nina does not notice her other needs, and ignores her even if she does. As long as the Perfectionist is in the Overcontrolling mode, his physical and psychological health is put into the background. Flexibility, which can be shown according to the situation and needs, does not exist at all when in overcompensation mode.
While the Perfectionist Overcontroller mod actually tries to live up to the Demanding Parent’s high expectations, the Punisher Parent’s Nina becomes even more inadequate and worthless.
He tries to prevent negative comments that will make you feel. In fact, as with all coping modes, she has the purpose of protecting Nina, preventing Hurt Child from suffering the pain of failure, being criticized, and shamed. But when we look at the big picture in the long term, we can see that it has brought Nina to a point where she is even more damaged.
Throughout the movie, Nina’s behavior begins to change as the Black Swan gets stronger. By the day of the show, we observe an increase in both Nina’s psychotic symptoms and her anxiety level.
Because it’s the first time Nina goes against what her schematics always say. She tries to cope differently. Nina’s Punishing Parent side disapproves of this. Increasing these symptoms
We can think of it as reacting with anxiety to what he is not used to.
Nina responds with the Obedient Submissive mode at points where her mother had previously triggered the Addiction and Submissiveness schemes, while she’s too hard to draw boundaries in the later scenes of the movie.
it reacts more unruly, that is, it goes into overcompensation modes. For example, when Lily invites Nina out for a drink one evening when she has a fight with her mother, Nina defies her mother and leaves. Nina’s spontaneous dancing and promiscuous sexual intercourse after alcohol and substance use in the places they go may also be Overcompensation for both Emotional Suppression, Submissiveness and Status Seeking schemes. The fact that she told him when she came home knowing her mother wouldn’t approve is again an overcompensation for the Submissiveness and Status Seeking schemes.
While at the beginning of the movie, Nina could not claim her due due to the Submissive scheme and could not speak out against the criticism and even bullying from her other colleagues, in the later stages she
We see that the Obedient Submissive mode has shifted to the Arrogant and Angry Bunker modes. In fact, he does not hesitate to inflict physical harm, if necessary, in order to maintain his place in the show.
Near the end of the movie, when show day comes, Erica doesn’t want Nina to appear on the show because she sees her mental health deteriorating, and she says she can’t even call to replace her. When Nina is decided on her behalf this time, unlike previous times, she goes into Grandiose mode and says, “I’m the Swan Queen, you’re the one who never succeeded,” and then goes into Zorba mode and manages to leave the room by physically harming her mother. He does the same thing to Lily backstage later. At the point where she should retire and can no longer be a principal ballerina, she went into Grandiosity mode, implying that Nina didn’t deserve this position.
is insulting. Then, in order to take revenge on others and maybe get all the attention back on him, he switches to Care and Approval Seeker mode and Deceitful and Manipulative mode and crashes.
doing. When Nina goes to see Beth at the hospital and says she thinks she’s perfect, she says she’s not perfect, and this time she stabs herself in the face in Punishing Parent mode.
The Punishing Parent mode, which says it’s not perfect, is so brutal that it brings it to the point of such self-harm. Of course, how much of this is real in the movie and how much is Nina’s?
As spectators, we cannot be sure that he has hallucinations. In summary, the picture we watch in the movie is quite complicated and describes a situation in which too many schemas and modes are triggered one after the other, and a serious psychopathology takes place. When we evaluate it in terms of perfectionism, we see how this pursuit can neglect other needs. In addition, it is understood how far the inner voice that says to be perfect is from the truth, bringing a feeling of inadequacy and burnout more than satisfaction.
Published in Feeling Good Magazine.
Anshel, MH (2004). Sources of disordered eating patterns between ballet dancers and non-dancers. Journal of Sport Behavior, 27(2), 115-133.
Nordin-Bates, SM, Cumming, J., Aways, D., & Sharp, L. (2011). Imagining yourself dancing to perfection? Correlates of perfectionism among ballet and contemporary dancers. Journal of Clinical
Sport Psychology, 5(1), 58-76.
Clinical Psychologist Yağmur Vardar
