Talk about "sound and fury, signifying nothing" ....

Rating: 4/10 (7 March 2015)

I won't add a blow-by-blow criticism of this film, as plenty of other reviewers have already provided those. My overall impression was summed up by one scene, where Michael Keaton's character goes to buy booze and we hear someone yelling lines from Macbeth's most famous soliloquy ("To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow ... full of sound and fury, signifying nothing"). Like that moment, _Birdman_ consists largely of hyperdramatic dialogue, delivered caustically, and without an obviously redeeming purpose.
That doesn't mean I'm blaming the actors; I think they work at a high level in fulfilling the director's vision. Unfortunately, that vision is almost relentlessly tawdry, depressing, and lacking in basic human warmth or decency.
This is probably some sort of paean to the nihilism of the acting world. Not being inside that world, all I saw and heard was an ugly, noisy mess, full of obscenities, lies, and bad behavior. It may be wonderfully self-referential if you're an actor or director or producer, but in my world, it just isn't entertaining.