"Birdman" Review

I finally watched the Oscar-winning Birdman, and to be frank, I was much underwhelmed. I expect a movie awarded as the “Best Picture” of the year to be something impressive, moving, or thought-provoking, but Birdman wasn’t really any of those things for me. It wasn’t horrible, but I certainly think some of the other nominees were better.

So, here is why I think Birdman won the award for “Best Picture.” It won because it reflects the narcissism, insecurities, and disjointedness of Hollywood itself. Although the film centers on a washed up actor on Broadway, its core is just as much about Hollywood. In that sense, an Academy vote for Birdman is really a vote for themselves.

In fact, it is interesting to see how frequently films about film-making and Hollywood end up either being nominated for “Best Picture” or winning the award in recent years: The Artist (2011), Hugo (2011), Argo (2012), and Birdman (2014). Three of the past four winners have been films about Hollywood. It seems as if the academy is not really interested in what is truly the “Best Picture,” but in what film best reflects their own values and culture.

That seems to be the case with Birdman. Certainly the struggles of Riggan in the film are very real for many actors (perhaps even Michael Keaton himself whose own career is eerily similar to Riggan’s). Just like many ordinary people in mid-life, actors and those in Hollywood encounter the questions of meaning, significance, and success. It may even be worse for them because of the dangers of celebrity and fame.

But here’s my problem, I don’t really care. Perhaps the most engaging part of the film is Riggan’s daughter’s (Emma Stone) rant against her father about the pointlessness of his current endeavors. 

  “Let’s face it, dad. You are not doing this for the sake of art. You are doing this because you want to feel relevant again. Well guess what, there’s an entire world out there where people fight to be relevant every single day, and you act like it doesn’t exist. Things are happening in a place that you ignore, in a place that, by the way, has already forgotten about you…You’re doing this because you’re scared to death, like the rest of us, that you don’t matter. And you know what, you’re right—you don’t. It’s not important, ok. You’re not important. Get used to it!”

 I felt drawn to this monologue because it rings true. The reality is that actors and celebrities are no more important than any nameless person on the streets. So, I don’t really care for the struggles of Riggan in the movie. His self-loathing does not elicit sympathy, not when there are real people with real struggles in the world. So, you’re an actor who’s discovering you’re human…Get used to it. You really aren’t important in the grand scheme of things. Your inner-conflict does not deserve any more sympathy or applause than anyone else’s.

And yet, the whole point of the Academy seems to be to deny this truth. In the end, all the Academy really seems to be is a group that gathers together to celebrate themselves, tout their own accomplishments, flaunt their wealth, and give each other fancy awards for doing something just about anyone in America can do—fake it. So whether a film celebrates actors (like Argo did), or critiques the excesses of fame (like Birdman), any such film acts like a mirror. And in the egocentric world of the Academy, the award, of course, is going to go to the reflection in the mirror.

This is not to say that Birdman was without artistic merit. The seamless, one-shot style in which the movie was filmed was unique. There were also some very touching and thought-provoking scenes. However, to say that it was the “Best Picture” seems an over-statement.

Perhaps the excessive amount of language in the film contributes to my cynicism. I don’t know about you, but there seems something disingenuous about throwing around the f-bomb and s-word over 150 times in a movie and calling that “acting.” It really just sounds like angry, nonsensical babbling to me (imagine if we substituted every version of “fuck” in the movie with a version of “poop”—poop, poopin, poop you, etc.) Far from offering an intense exploration of the human experience, that excessive amount of profanity just seems like you really have nothing to say.

Which is about where I ended up with Birdman. It tackles a number of themes—fame/celebrity, love/admiration, blockbuster/art, age/relevance—but in the end I felt it really did not have much to say to me. I have little sympathy for a character who complains about problems that seem so out of touch with the real world. In the end, it just really made me feel sorry for actors and those in Hollywood who have all the glitz and glitter but are so often lacking substance and meaning. These are things fame cannot buy. But, me feeling sorry for actors does not equate an award for Best Picture.

And so, the Academy’s decision to award Birdman that accolade just feeds into the cynical narrative that Hollywood is out of touch and self-absorbed—“Yes we do matter, because we say so.” Well, that’s great. Now the rest of us will continue along our ordinary lives until the next time we are beckoned to the worship service for Oscar.