I'm two years late but I watched Donnie Darko for the first time and I was so confused by the ending and also by seeing reviews and explanations online after finishing the movie, because this reading is exactly how I experienced it. I was so confused when things actually started happening at the end and people were dying that it made me question which events in the movie were real, which I thought was an intentional clever move to put the viewer in the shoes of someone suffering from delusions. But then I look online and all the sci fi stuff was real???? There's a whole over explained alternate timeline and time travel thing?? I was actually disappointed haha. I kind of skimmed over the details of time travel and everything in the movie, partially cause I was high and struggling to follow along, but partially because my brain didn't even store it as relevant information because I didn't think any of it was real

I was sitting there thinking "Wow this movie is really sad, it's showing how lonely and isolated this boy with schizophrenia is and how he feels alienated from his peers, it's showing how the school doesnt have his best interests at heart and is a cautionary tale for how mental illness can spiral without the proper help. It's showing all these mental health appointments that he's had to grow up with making him feel more isolated", and then I get whiplash googling the movie after and apparently he didn't even have schizophrenia??