Birdman (2014) [Blu-ray]
Comedy | Drama

"Michael Keaton delivers the best performance of his career" (Peter Travers, Rolling Stone) in this "funny, frenetic..." (Manohla Dargis, The New York Times) film from co-writer/director Alejandro G. Inarritu. When a has-been movie superhero (Keaton) risks everything for Broadway, he faces harsh critics, a deranged alter ego, his estranged daughter (Emma Stone) and a difficult stage star (Edward Norton). Also starring Naomi Watts and Zach Galifianakis, Birdman is "audacious, original, and bold" (Leonard Maltin, Indiewire.com).

Storyline: Actor Riggan Thomson is most famous for his movie role from over twenty years ago of the comic book superhero Birdman in the blockbuster movie of the same name and its two equally popular sequels. His association with the role took over his life, where Birdman is more renowned than "Riggan Thomson" the actor. Now past middle age, Riggan is trying to establish himself as a true artist by writing, directing, starring in and co-producing with his best friend Jake what is his Broadway debut, an adaptation of Raymond Carver's story, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. He is staking his name, what little artistic reputation that comes with that name and his life savings on the project, and as such will do anything needed to make the play a success. As he and Jake go through the process of the previews toward opening night, Riggan runs into several issues: needing to find a replacement for the integral supporting male role the night before the first preview; hiring the talented ... Written by Huggo

Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, February 12, 2015 -- Confession time: I never totally bought Michael Keaton as Batman . The actor's less than buff physique was one drawback, of course, though that could be "augmented" by a somewhat ridiculously puffy, muscle bound rubber suit. But Keaton's persona seemed slightly (or maybe more than merely slightly) snarky at times, as evidenced in any number of turns in films like Beetlejuice and Night Shift, something that seemed at odds with the tamped down, darker ambience that Tim Burton sought to bring to the venerable DC Comics reboot. Keaton experienced a fan backlash at the time, with many issuing a litany of complaints that at least partially echoed the above sentiments, but a lot of those people were won over once the film (and its sequel Batman Returns) actually came out. Keaton demurred from making a third Batman outing when Tim Burton left the franchise, and Batman Forever featured Val Kilmer in the iconic role. It's perhaps ironic that due to the disconnect between the character of Batman and Keaton's perceived persona, the actor didn't initially seen to be inescapably linked to the role, as Adam West had been after Batman: The Complete Series left the air. That said, Keaton's post-Batman filmography was a kind of spotty amalgamation of sometimes second rate material interspersed with occasional glimmers of brilliance (Jackie Brown). As the 1990s gave way to the new millenium, Keaton's film roles took a decided downturn, with generic entries like Herbie Fully Loaded seeming to reinforce the image that he was a "has been" who would now be relegated to B-movie character parts, if even that, and remembered largely if not totally for the Batman films. Perhaps that's one reason why Birdman seemed to virtually erupt into the cultural zeitgeist in an unexpected way. Rarely has an actor reinvigorated his or her career so substantially with one film, but as this review goes live, Keaton is already the winner of a Golden Globe for his performance and is the odds on favorite to take home an Academy Award for his portrayal of onetime film superstar Riggan Thomson, a guy who, not so coincidentally like Keaton himself, one sold "billions" in tickets as an iconic superhero, albeit one who is in the film called Birdman. Thomson has been down on his luck for some time and has decided to reinvent himself as a stage commodity, bringing an adaptation of a Raymond Carver piece to Broadway in a play that he not only is starring in, but which he has also written and is co-producing and directing.

The list of films skewering either the filmmaking world or its sibling the theater world is long and rather august, including such legendary outings as Sunset Boulevard, All About Eve, and Singin' in the Rain. Birdman sets itself apart from many of these films, however, by offering a relentlessly gritty, even dowdy, look at backstage life, something that contrasts rather incredibly with the more whimsical, magical realist, elements that intrude into the story with a fair amount of regularity. Take the opening shot of the film, for example. Riggan is in his dilapidated dressing room in the St. James Theater, meditating in a yoga posture in anticipation of going onstage for a rehearsal. It takes a moment for one salient fact to become apparent, though—Riggan appears to be levitating in lotus pose.

Within relatively short order, Birdman introduces a gaggle of other characters, including Riggan's seemingly dour, antagonistic daughter Sam (Emma Stone, Oscar nominated); harried attorney and co-producer Jake (Zach Galifianakis); and actors Lesley (Naomi Watts) and Laura (Andrea Riseborough). It's handled so organically that some who haven't read the massive press surrounding this film might not realize it, but all of this opening flurry of activity, and in fact almost all of the film itself, is captured in unedited long takes (a la Hitchcock's Rope). Director Alejandro G. Iñárritu's camera is a hyperkinetic microscope, flitting and darting throughout the labyrinthine halls of the theater, reinforcing that idea that there is burgeoning chaos at every turn in this production.

That chaos erupts onstage when a supporting actor Riggan is already unhappy with suffers a horrifying injury, one which Riggan oddly takes credit for, insisting to Jake that he has telekinetic powers that allow him to control at least some of his environment. This is one of Birdman's most outré elements, one which is not just referred to ambiguously, but which is depicted explicitly on screen, obviously introducing a paranormal aspect to Riggan that the opening levitation scene allusively presaged.

The injury to the actor brings the introduction of the last major character in the film, Mike Shiner (Edward Norton, Oscar nominated) a primo don actor and Broadway legend who just so happens to be Lesley's boyfriend. Mike is brought on as a replacement, and enters into an almost instantly contentious relationship with Riggan. Playing out against all of this onstage madness is the continuing inner dialogue Riggan has with his Birdman persona, an all seeing, all knowing force that speaks in the sort of husky tones that Keaton made famous in the Batman films, and which alternates between building Riggan up and tearing him down.

The sheer audacious originality of the screenplay (co-written by Iñárritu) and its realization by Iñárritu in his guise as director is the one thing critics tend to hate—it's largely indescribable. In fact there's a wonderful scene between Riggan and an uppity New York Times theater critic named Tabitha Dickinson (Lindsay Duncan) where he berates her work as nothing more than mere "descriptions" and "comparisons." It's a blistering critique of criticism and one that seems to be central to Iñárritu's attempt to bypass the rational mind to touch something more profound, if decidedly more ephemeral.

The magical realism, which in other hands probably would have come off as overly precious, is an integral part of this gambit, for it's inexplicable by design, short circuiting what is otherwise a fairly straightforward narrative of a Broadway play opening in disarray. Is Riggan specially powered, as seems to be hinted at rather vigorously in any number of sequences? Or is he simply just another massively deluded actor, as at least one sequence, where Riggan's "flying" is shown to actually be a taxi ride, tends to portray? Iñárritu willfully shies away from any overt answers, a tendency which is nowhere more obvious than in the perplexing final scene, where Riggan's very existence (or at least survival) may be questioned by some.

In a cinematic world rife with cookie cutter "entertainments," Birdman's completely unique if bizarre treatment of its subject matter is less like a breath of fresh air than a bracing, ice cold "bucket challenge" dumped unceremoniously over the collective heads of both filmmakers and audience members alike. For a film this stuffed full of whimsy and intentional artifice, the grounding of the performances is just another reason to come away from the viewing experience slightly awestruck. Keaton doesn't just run through a gamut of emotions here, he can segue seamlessly from rage to humor at the veritable drop of a hat (or Birdman cowl). Stone, whose orbs seem to make her tailor made to have starred in Big Eyes, brings spunk and vulnerability to the role of Sam, a girl struggling with "Daddy issues" and stints in rehab. While consigned largely to the sidelines, Naomi Watts and Andrea Riseborough have great moments as witnesses to the whirlwind. (My own favorite lines in the film come courtesy of this pair, when Lesley questions why she doesn't have more self esteem, and Laura quite calmly answers, "You're an actress.") Amy Ryan is also on hand briefly as Riggan's ex-wife, and brings a sweet naturalism to a somewhat underwritten role. And Edward Norton is simply perfect as an entitled, bratty actor who assumes he's the center of the known universe even if he suspects that he's only a bit player.

It's Iñárritu's fabulist approach that ultimately is Birdman's most distinctive but potentially most problematic element. It's no great secret that actors tend to be self-delusional types, and in that regard, the bizarre magical realism of Birdman is probably more organically integrated into the film than in Iñárritu's previous entry Biutiful, where sudden flights of fancy were prone to provoke a "WTF?" reaction more than anything. There is still that "WTF?" response running rampant throughout Birdman, but it's part and parcel of attempting to figure out exactly what's going on inside Riggan's addled head. The fact that Iñárritu (and his co-writers) seem deliberately discursive may ultimately annoy viewers who are otherwise fairly enchanted with this rather dark fairy tale. It's notable that two of the co-writers are on record as stating even they're not quite sure what the film's enigmatic closing moments might mean, and it's also notable that the ending of the completed film is not what was originally planned (a quick Googling of Birdman and Johnny Depp will reveal some perhaps surprising results). But for those who treasure questions at least as much as any potential answers, Birdman is simply one of the most remarkably idiosyncratic achievements in recent (and probably more than simply recent) film history.

Confession time: I may not have totally bought Michael Keaton as Batman, but I went for his Birdman hook, line and sinker. What a captivating and ultimately astonishing film this is. It may ask more questions than it ultimately answers, but you've never seen anything quite like it. A beautiful (Biutiful?) mix of backstage shenanigans and magical realism, Birdman is one of the highlights of this past year's theatrical releases and even without a bevy of supplements will certainly be among the best Blu-rays of 2015. Highly recommended.

Ending: Alejandro G. Inarritu's film about a washed-up actor trying to make a comeback on Broadway earned nine Academy Award nominations (winning four), as well as scores of other award nominations, and was featured on no less than 46 top ten lists. And it did all of this despite the fact that it has a rather strange ending. In the final scene, Riggan Thomas' (Michael Keaton) daughter Sam (Emma Stone) enters Riggan's hospital room to find his bed empty and an open window. Sirens and talking can be heard coming from the street below. Initially, Sam looks down, but she slowly turns her head to the sky and a smile appears on her face. This could mean that Riggan, who has been shown to have powers throughout the film, only to have them later be explained as hallucinations, actually has powers and has flown away, and his daughter is happy that he found a way to escape his dreary life. But that's not so. --- What really happens is that Riggan has successfully committed suicide, which he failed to do the previous day. In order to cope with this tragic event, Sam enters a hallucinatory world of her own. It stands to reason that she does this because her father hallucinates throughout the film. It could be a hereditary trait passed down from father to daughter. And the fact that she has bird tattoos on her arm and the her father played a superhero with bird-based powers suggests a strong connection between the two. Also, she herself is a recovering addict, so there's another potential hallucinatory explanation. Regardless, Sam disassociates with the real world and enters a fantasy world where her father lives, soaring above the clouds. The film is subtitled The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance after all, and here, Sam choses to ignore reality.

Trivia:________

[CSW] -3.0- One of the first scenes of Birdman (and the last) depicted a comet burning through a daytime sky giving the audience pause for interpretation: Mine was as The Bard said "…a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more." Birdman is a conversation. With itself. It's a fascinating one to sit back and listen to (and watch), but there's not really a beat that allows you, the viewer, to step in and offer your side. I recognize that this was a technically well-done movie with superb acting performances from the entire cast. Truly, seeing this entire movie play out as if it was done in one take was very impressive. However, the reason for my rating was because no matter how good the movie was, I still found it a bit dull and distracting. Personally, my favorite type of movie is one where you get absorbed in the story so much that you forget you are watching a product, where in Birdman I was so overly aware that this was a carefully crafted film, a piece of art, that it became impossible for me to just sit back and enjoy it. I know this makes me the type of person that this movie mocks, those who enjoy films with more style than substance, but so be it.
[V5.0-A4.0] MPEG-4 AVC - D-Box 10/10.


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