Birdman

Birdman (2014, Alejandro González Iñárritu)

The film is perhaps the director's most completely successful cinematic text which centres on the protagonist's survival instinct as an artist and his self-destruction. The film is continuously enjoyable for the consistency of the narrative and the power of unfolding a story in visual terms. The cinematography is brilliant and inspiring.  Because of the succession of ingenious sound and visual effects, the audience is invited to participate in the protagonist's subjective world. The participation allows the audience to roam through the labyrinth of off-stage and on-stage zones of the Broadway theatrical universe. Numerous shots employing the theatricality of real life emphasize the plausibility of the director's and photographer's handling. Simultaneously, the film is an attempt to produce the self-reflexive image of Michael Keaton as the actor who played the role of a superhero in Tim Burton's film, Batman (1986). Then, the film succeeds in portraying the revival of an artist's career by committing the violence on stage that draws the attention of the American Media. The excellent sequences embedded in the megalomaniac protagonist's hallucinations have associations with the subtlety of characterizations and the superiority of visual techniques. The annihilation, the humiliation, the despair, the disorientation and the confusion of the protagonist's emotional and intellectual upheavals are subtly conveyed to unite the progression and the development of the narrative with formal structure related to his subjectivity. The film is at its best when these protagonist's mind qualities provide the climactic moments of the film at the final sequences. While the ending of the film is open to interpretation, the particularly remarkable moment of ascension relieve the audience from the anxiety that bring confusion to the interpretation of the scene. Review: By Morad Sadeghi