Gothic Transformations – The Monstrous and Fragile Body in the cinema of Darren Aronofsky

After experiencing the much anticipated Black Swan, the idea of gothic hybridity and transformation in the cinema of Darren Aronofsky has returned to me again and again. The film’s popularity, compounded  by the recent Oscar nominations and the apparently “insane” ending (according to film reviewers in Ireland and the UK at least), has led me to think critically not only about the increasing mainstream interest in the transformative body onscreen, but also in a continuing focus in director Darren Aronofsky’s films to date. In a myriad of ways, Pi (1998), Requiem for a Dream (200