Here is a black comedy that teases the popular taste by dressing up very much like the purveyor of larger than life cinema. It makes fun of one at the cost of the other and in the process shows the label loving critics their place. Count your adjectives, guys, as Alejandro Inarritu (Amores Perros, Babel, Biutiful) crafts yet another masterpiece on the futility of interpretations, on the hollowness of labels and the duality of life. And above all gives the magic, we love to ignore, in everyday life a chance.
After flying aimlessly in superhero movies, Riggan Thomson (Michael Keaton of Batman fame), a fading star, known for playing Birdman, a superhero with metaphysical powers, shifts stage for acceptance as real actor. As he mounts a Broadway production based on Raymond Carver’s short story “What We Talk About When We Talk About Love”, his family life explodes and his ego is tested. The line between life and stage blurs.
Known to play with the form, here Inarritu shoots Birdman like a continuous take. There are edit points but they are so seamless that the narrative simply flows on screen creating delicious intensity and urgency that goes well with the theatre backdrop where it is all about one take. Edward Norton embodies that one take method actor, who doesn’t care for endorsement from anybody. Of course, critics love him. An anti-thesis of Riggan, as the sparks fly between them, the film gets its best moments. The support cast is excellent particularly Emma Stone stands out as Sam, the unhappy daughter of Riggans.
You can’t take your eyes off Keaton. And the fact that he has a Batman connection helps breaking the reel/real divide. In his private moments, Riggans acquires the powers of Birdman. He can levitate! Is it for real? Inarritu doesn’t simply reduce it to his imagination and leaves room for discussion or what they call magic realism. Along the way it comments on definition of celebrity is changing, how social media is dragging us down for Riggan gets more attention when he is locked out of his own production and is forced to walk the street in an underwear.
It makes the film realistic and eccentric at the same time. Like the truth or dare game that Riggan plays with his daughter you never know where it is headed. Perhaps, that’s what explains the film’s full title – Birdman: Or, The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance .