BLACK SWAN (15, 108 mins)****
Starring Natalie Portman, Vincent Cassel, Mila Kunis, Barbara Hershey, Winona Ryder

Natalie Portman collected a Golden Globe award as Best Actress on Sunday for her tour-de-force portrayal of an emotionally-fragile ballerina.

She deserves to win the Oscar in February for this career-defining performance that required ten months of gruelling physical preparation before the cameras started rolling.

All of that incredible will and discipline in the dance studio certainly pays off – not once do we doubt that Portman could perform the demanding solos from Swan Lake that punctuate this psychological drama.

She powerfully conveys the disparity between her character’s physical strength and grace, and her mental frailty when insecurities and jealousy steadily gnaw away at her self-confidence.

The film gracefully pirouettes between reality and fantasy as we join Portman on this mesmerising descent into madness.

Artistic director Thomas Leroy (Cassel) presides over a ballet company at New York’s Lincoln Center, all too aware that his productions have lost their edge.

So he terminates the services of prima ballerina Beth Macintyre (Ryder) and chooses Nina Sayers (Portman) as her replacement to lead an erotically-charged new staging of Swan Lake.

Nina is technically gifted, but she struggles to express her emotions on stage, which causes friction with Thomas, who needs her to embrace her dark side if she is ever to play the Black Swan.

Soon after, sensual ballerina Lily (Kunis) is cast as understudy to the lead role and Nina feels threatened, as if the new girl is trying to usurp her.

Harangued by her mother (Hershey), a former dancer who gave up everything to raise a family, Nina wrestles with fear and paranoia, teetering on the brink of an emotional breakdown.

Black Swan stokes the tension as we become immersed in this tale of delusions and dreams.

Portman’s fearless performance is complemented by a monstrous turn from Hershey and a deliciously-ambiguous performance from Kunis.

Cassel radiates a feral sexuality in his scenes with Portman, urging Nina to unleash the temptress within before he regrets his decision to cast her.

Sequences from Swan Lake are dazzlingly choreographed to Clint Mansell’s soundtrack (inspired by Tchaikovsky’s haunting score), making the ballet accessible and thrilling to audiences who are unfamiliar with the story of accursed Odette.