"Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)" (2014) - Film Review (10/10)

Rating: 10/10 (1 March 2015)

*GREAT MOVIE* Mike Shiner: Popularity is the slutty little cousin of prestige.
There's drums, "Birdman" stomps across the screen. There's a quick flash of a beach with jellyfish, a meteor plummeting to Earth, then there's Michael Keaton; floating in mid-air Indian style. After these first few minutes of Alejandro G. Inarritu's "Birdman" went by, so many thoughts flew through my brain that I started to smile trying to figure things out. Without doing much, "Birdman" gives you a lot to think about just in the first couple of minutes. What does this mean? Why did this happen? How bizarre, how strange, how weird, how curious, how unbelievably intriguing? After Keaton leaves his dressing room, the camera follows him, and doesn't stop. It moves to other people, follows their lives, their thoughts, then comes back. I cannot get over how innovative and intriguing this film is. Along with this brilliant camera-work, the film has a fantastic script; sharp, funny, and even satirical. I smiled the whole time while watching this film.
"Birdman" is the story of a man who used to play an iconic superhero in the movies, who's now haunted by these memories in his own mind, who tries to make it on Broadway. The movie is a trip through the lives of our main character, Riggan (the guy who played Birdman) and the others surrounding him. It reminded me of a Tarantino movie in a way, because of the level of ambition in the script, and the long, but masterful, meaningful scenes.
"Birdman" is the best film of the year. It stands out, it's on a completely different level of filmmaking.