Black Swan

A censorship board has reversed a decision to forbid theaters in Barbados from showing "Black Swan" because of its sexual and violent content. The Cinematograph Film Censorship Board reviewed its decision after a theater filed an appeal. The board announced Wednesday that the movie would be shown under an "R" rating, as it has been in the U.S. Hundreds of people signed an online petition asking the Caribbean nation's board to reverse its decision. Hundreds more joined a Facebook page titled "For Freedom of Thought and Expression in Barbados.

Poor Charlie Sheen! In the opening of "Scary Movie V," no sooner does he bed Lindsay Lohan - both barely convincing playing themselves - than a ghost kills him and kidnaps his three kids. (Legal troubles aside, Lohan is fine.) Three months later, Snoop Dogg finds the now-crabwalking moppets in a haunted cabin in Humboldt County and delivers them and their new ghost mom back to civilization. Three months is auspicious. "Scary Movie V" lifts its plot from Jessica Chastain's surprise horror hit "Mama," released in January, and if you think three months is an impossible amount of time to write and produce a feature film, well, it is. In the Oscar nominee's role is former Disney star Ashley Tisdale, here seen having her way with a microwave.

Without a dance double in sight, Natalie Portman appeared to be using her "Black Swan" ballet training during a recent shoot for a Christian Dior fragrance ad in Paris. The 31-year-old actress strikes pointed poses in the fountain at Jardins du Palais Royal while wearing a strapless silk couture gown that looks like a longer version of the black tutu she donned in the final scenes of "Black Swan. " Portman trained eight hours a day and lost 20 pounds for her Oscar-winning role as a troubled prima ballerina in the 2010 film.

Darren Aronofsky's movies like "Black Swan" and "Requiem for a Dream" get much of their creepy edge from Clint Mansell's spine-tingling, dissonant yet ethereal scores. At this rare show, he'll perform from a big swath of his work with Aronofsky and his career as a pop musician and producer. The Orpheum, 842 S. Broadway, L.A. 8 p.m. Sat. $30-$48. laorpheum.com.

'Swan' flies high "Black Swan" has danced past the $300-million mark at the global box office, a feat few independent films are able to accomplish. The film, which earned star Natalie Portman an Academy Award for lead actress earlier this year, has quietly continued to roll out overseas. This weekend, the movie finally opened in Japanese theaters, where it collected $6.1 million, according to an estimate from distributor Fox Searchlight. That was enough to push its international total to $198.4 million, and its worldwide tally to $305 million.

'Black Swan' MPAA rating: R for strong sexual content, disturbing violent images, language and some drug use Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes Playing: At ArcLight, Hollywood; Landmark, West L.A.

The premise Nina Sayers (Natalie Portman) dances for a New York City ballet company that is preparing for a production of "Swan Lake. " Stressed out by the competition to be the Swan Queen and smothered by a controlling mother (Barbara Hershey), Nina starts scratching and pulling off chunks of her own skin. She suffers from growing paranoia and startling delusions, including violent and erotic hallucinations involving her competitor Lily (Mila Kunis). On stage, Nina gives stirring performances as both the white swan and the evil seductress black swan.

You won't be having a lot of fun at "Black Swan," but the less seriously you take this wildly melodramatic, unashamedly pulpy look at the blood sport that is New York City ballet, the better your chances are of enjoying yourself even a little. This tale of feathered ambition starring Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis as dueling ballerinas is not just any kind of trash, it's high-art trash, a kind of "When Tutu Goes Psycho" that so prizes hysteria over sanity that it's worth your life to tell when its characters are hallucinating and when they're not. In fact, the only problem with calling "Black Swan" sensationalistic and over the top is that it makes this shameless shotgun marriage of "The Red Shoes" and Roger Corman sound like more fun than it is. The director here is the earnest Darren Aronofsky, and his trademark sledgehammer style makes any kind of enjoyment difficult.

"Black Swan," director Darren Aronofsky's psychological thriller set in the world of professional ballet, is a stylish treat. Not only does the film, which opened this weekend, boast exquisite, Rodarte-designed ballet costumes, it also showcases some striking makeup artistry by award-winning makeup designer Judy Chin. Chin has worked on dozens of films, including "The Tempest," which also opens this month, as well as "Frida," "The Royal Tenenbaums," "Requiem for a Dream" and the "Sex and the City" films.

It was just before 10 p.m. on a Wednesday night in Los Feliz, and the assorted filmgoers that had gathered to see "Black Swan" sounded as if they were attending different movies. Nas Moinee, 23, had come for the dancing and the costumes and was dreading the film's scares. Peter Garcia, a longhaired, ball-cap-wearing 12-year-old attending with his mother, said he was looking forward to jumping out of his seat at the movie's spooky scenes. And while Shawna Joplin, 28, had bought a ticket because she heard about a bravura performance from star Natalie Portman, her companion, Greg Richmond, 32, came because his friends told him about an explicit sex scene between Portman and costar Mila Kunis.

Foreign auteurs tend to enjoy a good metaphoric image or three. And few like them more than Chan-wook Park, the South Korean filmmaker behind violent cult hits such as "Oldboy. " In "Stoker," Park's English-language debut starring Nicole Kidman that opened in Los Angeles last weekend, there are a number of memorable images. They're all there for a reason. "Stoker" centers on the loner India (Mia Wasikowska), her aloof and at times rivalrous mother (Kidman) and India's affectionate but mysterious uncle Charlie (Matthew Goode)

It's not unusual for a specialty film label to juggle multiple contenders going into awards season. But it's pretty rare to be pushing the majority of your releases in a single year. That's the situation Fox Searchlight is in as four of its seven 2012 releases are considered serious players for top Oscar, Golden Globe and guild nominations: "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel," "Beasts of the Southern Wild," "The Sessions" and "Hitchcock. " It's quicker to count this year's Fox Searchlight movies that won't be getting "for your consideration" ads ("Sound of My Voice," "Lola Versus" and "Ruby Sparks")

Who exactly is Benjamin Millepied as a choreographer? Hard to tell. Lots of us have seen his forceful neoclassic inventions for actresses and their dance doubles in the film "Black Swan. " Before that, he showed Southern California audiences an astute, compassionate piece (in several versions) for and about Mikhail Baryshnikov. More recently, he unveiled three relentlessly frothy, unmusical showcases for the Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève. On Thursday, as a kind of fanfare for his upcoming L.A. Dance Project performances in Walt Disney Concert Hall - a September event that appears to have little "L.A.

Without a dance double in sight, Natalie Portman appeared to be using her "Black Swan" ballet training during a recent shoot for a Christian Dior fragrance ad in Paris. The 31-year-old actress strikes pointed poses in the fountain at Jardins du Palais Royal while wearing a strapless silk couture gown that looks like a longer version of the black tutu she donned in the final scenes of "Black Swan. " Portman trained eight hours a day and lost 20 pounds for her Oscar-winning role as a troubled prima ballerina in the 2010 film.

Moscow's mighty Bolshoi Ballet, the brash and emotionally outsized one of Russia'stwo historic companies, inspired a déjà vu experience of bittersweet intensity with its return Thursday to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Onstage was Yuri Grigorovich's "Swan Lake," closing out this season's Glorya Kaufman Presents Dance at the Music Center series (through Sunday). Grigorovich ruled the Bolshoi as director and chief choreographer for 30 long years, finally stepping down from the top position in 1995.

What, no pointe shoes? Two things lead you to expect pointe shoes from Ballet du Grande Théâtre de Genève when the company arrives at the Music Center's Dorothy Chandler Pavilion for performances next weekend. The first is the name - it's called ballet, right? Sure, the women of today's ballet companies take off the boxy satin footwear sometimes for contemporary work, but ballet in a company moniker still implies that pointe shoes rule. The second is the company's Los Angeles program, which includes three works by French dancer-choreographer Benjamin Millepied, widely known as choreographer for the 2010 movie "Black Swan" - featuring his take on that very pointe -intensive classical ballet "Swan Lake.

"Black Swan," the new psycho-sexual thriller set in the world of ballet, follows the downward emotional spiral of a young dancer whose inability to separate art and life leads to horrific and bloody consequences. The movie, directed by Darren Aronofsky and starring Natalie Portman, is seen as a top awards contender. Critics have been sharply divided, with some praising the extreme depiction of lunacy while others have been turned off by the same. "Black Swan" takes a wildly subjective approach to the heroine's descent into madness.

Dancing before sold-out crowds "Black Swan" is looking like more than an art-house hit. Fox Searchlight expanded the ballet drama starring Natalie Portman to 90 theaters from 18 on its second weekend and took in a phenomenal $3.3 million. Despite playing on so few screens, it was the nation's No. 6 movie. "Black Swan" sold out most shows, not only in urban theaters that regularly play offbeat indie films but also in cities such as Burbank and Huntington Beach that often favor more mainstream fare.

Several months ago, at the height of my disillusionment with online dating, I created a "Black Swan" profile for a dating site (My "White Swan" profile was up and running on the same site). I didn't actually name the profiles White Swan and Black Swan, but that's how I thought of them, inspired by the deliciously over-the-top Natalie Portman movie that came out around the same time. The White Swan had been busy dating. In fact, she'd just been dumped by a guy who suddenly realized his Westside neighborhood was 20 miles away from her -- my -- Eastside domicile.

SERIES Doctor Who: All time and space hang in the balance on the day the Doctor dies in the season finale (6 p.m. BBC America). Bedlam: This new occult drama opens as an emotionally fragile young man (Theo James) who sees ghosts rushes to the side of his cousin (Charlotte Salt) after receiving a series of text messages that she is in danger. Will Young, Ashley Madekwe and Hugo Speer also star (7 and 10 p.m. BBC America). Saturday Night Live: Melissa McCarthy hosts with musical guest Lady Antebellum (11:29 p.m. NBC)