Alejandro González Iñárritu
Birdman

Birdman is success.

Birdman is celebrity.

Birdman is a superhero,

Birdman is a blazing comet shooting across the sky.

Birdman is now old.

Birdman is a stranded jellyfish.

But Birdman doesn't exist because Birdman is Riggan Thompson (Michael Keaton) but Riggan doesn't exist because for everyone, he is only and solely Birdman.

Deep down, Riggan knows he is an actor, an artist, and he risks everything: a Broadway theatrical production of a Carver work revisited, adapted, directed, and produced by him. I'm not just a flying puppet!

Ok, we are in the theater, backstage in the dressing rooms, we are with Riggan who continuously fights against Birdman, his "flying" part that speaks to him in his head and says leave it, it's not for you. We too are present in an endless, incredibly complicated and majestic long take. A monstrously technical film, very talented actors starting with Keaton who delivers the performance of a lifetime, to Edward Norton real on stage and fake and an asshole in life just as they say he is in reality, to Birdman's daughter, a Emma Stone ex-addict, alienated, beautiful. There is also Naomi Watts but she doesn't hold up in the comparison this time, she has quite a secondary role.

It's an extraordinary film, with fast-paced dialogues, foul language, a sprinkle of hard dicks and a lesbian scene just because. There's a lot at stake: you exist only if others see you, vaguely Pirandellian in this respect. It's a current film: so to be seen you must be on social media from Twitter to Facebook and your success is now determined by the number of views you get and not necessarily by merits earned on the field.

Birdman undoubtedly deserves to be seen in cinemas if only for how it is extraordinarily crafted and yet it didn't convince me, I didn't believe in it fully (I give 4 stars, I don't think I can give less ...but I don't give 5).

Ok, come on ...for what are my capacities as a "film critic" I think I've said too much, I'm tired, old, and heavy ...but I'd like to open the window and fly away ...like Birdman!