Donnie Darko is the main character and is therefore present in every scene within the film.
The lighting within the film is all natural, using the sun and florescent lights within the home - as well as, using street lights to bring light into the night time streets.
Kelly does use a mixture of dramatic lighting in these scenes, especially when Donnie is talking to his psychiatrist, and during the scenes in which he is battling with his psychosis (ranging from him encountering Frank, to him proceeding with criminal activities).
There is dialogue within the film, and it is present as a distinctive key to the film. All the dialogue is necessary to understand the depth of the characters, as well as, their relationship to one another. This is evident within Donnie's family especially, and can be found in various scenes including the dinner scene in the beginning. It is also important because the supporting characters have a tendency to say certain things that seem like foreshadowing. For example: When the beginning, when part of the airplane engine fell into Donnie's room, he comes back to survey the scene - and his sister whispers to him that the Airlines cannot identify the plane, they don't know where it came from. Or when him and his friends observe "Grandma Death" as they call her, and one of his friends joke, "Someone should write that bitch a letter", because she's always checking the mailbox - and Donnie does.
Kelly uses a few different techniques within the film including slow motion. He utilizes slow motion to concentrate on significant scenes usually where music is involved. A good example: would be Donnie's day at school, he gets out of the school bus, and the camera is angled side ways as he exits. It shifts upright, and everything occurs in slow motion throughout the rest of the sequence. It pans past people and lockers, only concentrating on people who will become significant within the next couple of scenes. On that same note, he uses a few sequences of fast motion, where he speeds up certain sequences such as, school getting out - so that Donnie can appear again in a different scene.
Kelly also switches scenes a lot, where he'll show an event that is occurring somewhere else at the same time and switch to what is happening to Donnie during that time. A good example would be after the water main breaks and the PTO as a meeting on campus. Donnie is home and goes into the bathroom to take his medication when he hears Frank's voice. It then switches back and forth between Donnie's conversation with Frank - and the PTO's conversation about the book in question.
Kelly really enjoys keeping his camera's still and allowing his characters to move themselves across the screen and out of the frame. This can be from a portrait view, where the character's head or most of their face is cut out as they move out of the frame. Or this can be from the knees up, as a cropping, where the head moves out of the frame at a diagonal and disappears before the rest of the limbs.
Kelly switches the viewpoint to show whoever is speaking, and allows the other individuals to move in and out of the scenes at weird angles. This can be seen when Donnie walks into his new room, after he gets suspended and his parents bought him entirely new furniture. His sister is completely within the frame, sitting on his bed to the right side - and Donnie moves in from the right side initially blotting out the scene as he walks across.
Kelly uses black scenes to shift from one section of time to the next, which is accompanied by a date and time that indicates how short of a span of time the movie takes place. It seems like he does it to break up the movie into sequences or "acts" where each one is rising closer to the climax of the film. It indicates a countdown to what Donnie believes to be the end. He uses a blow out once- when the President of the school is leaving the school during the panning scene.
The music within the film fits it very well - it adds to the ominous atmosphere of Donnie's experiences. He also chose to slow down some of the musical sequences, and there is no dialogue within these scenes. He relies completely on the body language between these characters to convey the message between the characters and how it relates to the music. For example: During the panning of school, the music is "Head over Heels" by Tears For Fears, which reflects on the relationship that will form in the next scene between Donnie and a new girl.
Kelly uses close ups a couple of times, usually to indicate importance. For example: He zeros in on Donnie's arm when he wakes up after meeting Frank for the first time (as seen above), he zeros in on the clock as it chimes when Donnie is getting ready to be contacted by Frank before the engine crash - and then it also zeros in on the circular pattern on the jet engine.
We get the opportunity as viewers to see scenes from both the perspective of a viewer of Donnie, as well as, seeing what he sees. This puts the audience in an interesting position as the movie progresses, simply because it becomes harder and harder to tell if Donnie is "crazy" at all.
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