Review: "Birdman (or The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)"

Director: Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu
Runtime: 119 minutes

Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu has always displayed gifts as a storyteller and as a director of actors. His key weakness, largely due to collaborations with writer Guillermo Arriaga, is that he wants to stretch his vision over far too much. His 2006 drama Babel, though beautifully photographed and acted, was a manipulative and contrived mess. The intersecting stories felt like attempts at making something capital I important rather than authentically compelling. Even after parting ways with Arriaga, Inarritu fell into the same trap with 2010's Biutiful. Once again, strong visuals and powerful acting held back by an exasperating amount of plots and subplots. 

Only four years later, however, Inarritu has finally shed his attempts at creating a sprawling game of narrative connect-the-dots. Working with three other credited writers, the director's latest, Birdman, finds him taking on a script actually worthy of his skills. Straightforward, lively, and devoid of narrative flab, Birdman is a bravura work of directing topped off with excellent performances (welcome back, Michael Keaton) and thrillingly ambitious photography.

With the globe-spanning finally laid by the wayside, Inarritu confines nearly all of Birdman in and around a prominent New York theater. It's there where, after a brief and cryptic opening, we meet aging star Riggan Thompson (Keaton), meditating in nothing but his underwear. Oh, and he's levitating about four feet off of the ground, or at least that's what his mind has him believe. 

Riggan, as realized here, smartly incorporates Keaton's actual status as an actor, without going overboard with the parallels and references. In the late 80s and early 90s, Riggan was the star of the mega-successful Birdman superhero franchise. That is, until he declined to star in a fourth film, and promptly sent his career into a tailspin. Now, he sits in his dreary looking dressing room watching Robert Downey Jr. rake in obscene amounts of money in the wake of Hollywood's current superhero obsession. 

The star dressing room for the Broadway stage is a dream for so many actors, including Riggan's costar Lesley (Naomi Watts). For the former lycra-clad superhero, however, it's much more; it's a chance to put it all out there for the world to see, and bring some credibility back to the faded glory of his name. From the moment that Riggan starts talking about his play - an adaptation of a Raymond Carver story - it's clear that his trip to the stage as writer, actor, and director is all that he has left in himself. 

Despite the talented ensemble that fleshes out Birdman's insular world, and the strong moments they all have, one thing is clear: this is Keaton's movie, and it's going to live or die by what he delivers. He succeeds. I've started that short and simple so as to prevent myself from exploding with hyperbole. Electrifying is an easy word to throw around, but Keaton surely earns it. His casting (combined with the part's writing) gives him something to tap into, but it's more than that. In the two hours we spend with Riggan, Keaton captures all of his guilt, frustration, desperation, and rage with the precision of a tightrope walker. 

The tightrope comparison applies not only to Keaton or his castmates, but Birdman as a complete entity. Filmed and edited to appear as if 95% of the movie occurs in an uninterrupted shot, Birdman's near-constant movement keeps the storytelling and performances consistently on edge. As it turns out, technical ambition works much better for Inarritu than narrative ambition.

But even though Inarritu has enlisted the great Emmanuel Lubezki (The Tree of Life, Gravity), the camerawork is always kept in service of the story and, more importantly, the characters. With the camera turning and circling and prowling all over the place nonstop, the early sequences of Birdman are unusually buoyant. It captures the frazzled, hypersensitive state of Thompson's mind as he's met with everything from stage disaster's to a hilariously difficult new cast member (Edward Norton). Better yet, the impressive technique on display ends up actually being in service of the film's endgame, rather than a mere bit of cinephile fan service. 

Birdman is, for all the flourishes, a story about the art of saving artistic face while reasserting one's cultural relevance in the increasingly over saturated world of modern celebrity. Riggan does his best to care for his daughter Sam (Emma Stone), but his best involves hiring her as an assistant. He gets to technically spend time with his daughter, but still get use out of her as he prepares to take the defibrillator to his reputation.

Everyone else is merely a means to an end, though that doesn't mean that Inarritu and his writers have left the other headliners without anything to work with. Norton is especially fun as a pompous stage veteran Mike, providing the perfect external antagonist to drive the film's first half. And he's not just a grotesque caricature of a jerk. His interactions with Riggan contain their own cruel grains of truth, even if they've been distorted by Mike's own pretension and ego. Watts, meanwhile, is nervy and vulnerable, and brings sincerity (or at least the illusion of sincerity) to Lesley, a woman on the verge of finally having her break as she's entering a stage in life where good parts start to vanish. And, as Riggan's former and current partners, Amy Ryan (ex-wife) and Andrea Riseborough (friend with benefits) each lend their own valuable contributions to Birdman's tale of ambition in the face of dashed hopes and dreams. Lindsay Duncan also leaves her mark as the formidable New York Times critic out for blood, and able to deflect each and every verbal blow Riggan throws her way.

All of the above performers have their time to shine, but none impresses quite like Emma Stone. Sam's status as a former addict is never belabored by the writing or directing, leaving Stone room to tap into her character's past while still be able to forge her own future. As good as everyone is here, Stone's interactions with Keaton are the ones I was left desperate for more of when the lights came up. Too often type cast as sassy, cutesy romantic leads, she slips into this damaged, no-bullshit psyche beautifully. Finally, with room to do something truly different, Stone takes charge, and comes closest to matching Keaton in commitment to every unpleasant little detail doled out by the script. Mike presents an artistic challenge, and the booming voice in Riggan's head is a psychological challenge, but only Sam is the real deal when it comes to affecting legitimate reflection in Riggan's life. Everything else, despite all the fuss about reviews and box office intake, is secondary, regardless of what Riggan tells himself.

There is a deep sadness at the core of Birdman, but Inarritu and his collaborators have kept the whole enterprise such a dynamic, spontaneous atmosphere that there's little room to get mired in existential woe. Lubezki's camera demands that, even in the most painful confession, Riggan - and therefore, the audience - keep moving forward. Accentuated by a soundtrack composed of rapturous classical pieces and Antonio Sanchez's drums-only score, and Birdman takes on the movements of a piece of experimental jazz. It's always going, always searching for whatever happens next, thrilling you with its next camera movement or powerful feat of acting, only to go somewhere totally different at a moment's notice. Under Inarritu's firm hand in the director's chair, that vivaciousness is under tight control, yet maintains the feeling of being executed off of the cuff. 

Many filmmakers, even great ones, struggle with the balance of style and substance. Inarritu, unlike many of his similarly-afflicted contemporaries, has both of them down. Yet on the matter of substance, he's only succeeded in investigating the emotional core of his stories and characters. The methods of investigation are where the problems show up. After Biutiful's false start at new beginnings, Birdman delivers the great film that Inarritu has had in him ever since he debuted Amores Perros nearly 15 years ago. Birdman's eventual, visceral impact is the direct result of this long-delayed artistic growth. Inarritu has spent his career swinging for the fences and tossing off foul balls. The difference, due to his newfound narrative focus, is that this time he's finally able to get the bat and the ball to connect at the sweet spot.

Grade: A

Review: "The Campaign"

Director: Jay Roach
Runtime: 85 minutes

Despite an early penchant for goofball comedies like Austin Powers and Meet the Parents, Jay Roach has evolved into quite the politically minded director. First came 2008's HBO film Recount, which tackled the aftermath of the (still) controversial recounts after the 2000 election. And then, just a few months ago, Roach and HBO gave us a second collaboration - Game Change - that looked behind the scenes of the 2008 election from the standpoint of the McCain/Palin campaign. Despite flashes of humor, both films showed that Roach was capable of doing much more than simply directing comedy vehicles for Ben Stiller. So, with the 2012 election right around the corner, it's not surprising to see a Roach-directed film in theaters centering around politics. The difference, though, is that Roach's latest, The Campaign, is a mix of the sincere political commentary of Roach's Game Change combined with the cartoon wackiness of your typical Will Ferrell comedy. As a result, the film is certainly relevant, but the humor is less successful, and The Campaign feels more like a valiant missed opportunity than a riotously funny political farce.

No stranger to playing larger-than-life oafs, Will Ferrell plays Cam Brady, a North Carolina Congressman who has never lost an election...because he was always running unopposed.  Over in Washington D.C., the manipulative Motch brothers (Dan Aykroyd and John Lithgow)   decide that Brady's district would be the perfect spot to pull off a scheme to help them become even wealthier. They decide to fund a candidate to unseat Brady, and settle on Marty Huggins (Zach Galifianakis), a sweet oddball of a man who is estranged from his wealthy father (Brian Cox). From there, it's a slowly escalating war of idiocy as Huggins tries to take on Brady.

And just as Ferrell is comfortable playing oafs, Galifianakis is more than comfortable playing oddballs. Marty is a mincing, oddly prissy man who seems incapable of ever becoming angry, and Galifianakis nails the role when it comes to the broad strokes of the part. Unlike Ferrell, Galifianakis has a role that is (somewhat) opened up for an iota of genuine depth. After Brady humiliates Huggins at a supposedly friendly political breakfast, we see Marty walking to his car in tears. But Roach isn't playing up Marty's sadness for laughs. It's nothing heart-wrenching, to be certain, but Roach does allow it to work as a moment that can be played straight. Compared with the all-out silliness that characterized the Austin Powers films, The Campaign marks an interesting evolution in Roach's execution as a comedy director.

That's not to say that the film doesn't include the usual looniness. Most of it stems from Ferrell's side, particularly in the opening stretches before we first meet Marty. Where Marty is built up as a more sincere figures (despite some goofy scenes and lines), Cam is bombastic and hollow, though Roach and Ferrell keep the character from becoming as over the top as so many of the actor's other notable comedic roles. Playing things much more 'straight' is Dylan McDermott as Marty's Motch-appointed campaign manager, who so thoroughly gives Marty's life a make over that he even replaces his dogs (pugs) because they aren't American enough.

It's scenes like this that call to mind broader versions of the "make over" scenes of the Palin family in Game Change, and Roach proves adept at handling the very different forms of execution. Unfortunately, Roach doesn't really elevate the material he's working with, aside from keeping the proceedings from becoming total buffoonery. Though the film maintains a decent momentum, the script jumps unevenly between Brady and Huggins. Rather than feel like a solid look at both candidates, the alignment of scenes gives the feeling that the film would rather just stick with one major character, but then remembers that, oh yeah, there's that other guy. And even though the script has entertaining lines and scenes, they're more mildly amusing than hilarious. In trying to inject a bit of the maturity showcased in Game Change and Recount, Roach has somewhat sedated the broad comedy that the script is striving for. 

So when The Campaign settles into its last act, there's no doubt as to where it's going to go, in terms of narrative and message. Game Change, with its strong rooting in reality, packs more surprise. Ferrell and Galifianakis' talents are decently handled, but at this point in Roach's career, he doesn't seem like such a good fit for this sort of material on the whole. He wants to have dumb laughs and semi-earnest political commentary working side by side. Though it fares better than another Ferrell vehicle (the awful The Other Guys) in striving towards this goal, The Campaign winds up little more than a mildly amusing and thoughtful farce, rather  than a truly hilarious comedy with a thoughtful side.

Grade: C+

Review: "The Hangover Part II"

It opens with an exasperated phone call. An exhausted and grimy-looking man named Phil (Bradley Cooper), contacts the bride of his friend Doug (Justin Bartha), to let her know that things have gone horribly wrong. The many who have seen 2009's The Hangover know this as the opening scene. The many who have yet to see the sequel likely don't know that I've also just described the opening of Part II.

For better or for worse, Todd Phillips' sequel to his '09 blockbuster could almost pass as a remake, considering how similar it is. Just as Baz Lurhmann relocated Romeo and Juliet to California, Phillips has relocated The Hangover to Bangkok, only with the same actors, and only 2 years later. The result is not necessarily a cash-grab. It has funny moments amidst the carbon-copy set-up and structure. It just makes you wonder why they bothered to essentially make the same movie over again, only with minor differences and set in an even seedier locale.

Not that there aren't some minor changes in the details. This time Stu (Ed Helms) is the one getting married, and the missing person isn't Doug, but the 16-year-old brother of the bride-to-be (Mason Lee). Come to think of it, Mr. Bartha's presence in the movie feels almost unnecessary, as he's not among those suffering from a disastrous hangover. The character who was once the object of a frenzied search has been relegated to the role played by his wife, receiving calls and asking "what happened?" Meanwhile, the original wolf pack of Phil, Stu, and Alan (Zach Galifianakis) goes through roughly the same routine as last time. They wake up disoriented, in a trashed room (although the inherently crappier room lessens the effect of any damage the characters caused). Instead of a missing tooth, Stu now has a tattoo which he doesn't remember getting, Alan's head is shaved, there's a vest-wearing monkey hanging around, and there's a finger in a bowl of melted ice. Phil just looks worn out, which I'm assuming is part of Cooper's secret contract wherein it states that he must always look attractive on screen.

As the trio traverse Bangkok and begin piecing another wild and crazy night back together, the film's reliance on formula rears its ugly head. It doesn't sink the film, but it robs it of the pseudo-mystery fun of the first. We now know to expect insane, outrageous happenings. So while some of the surprises may top the original in shock-value, the overall impact is muted. Still, the character interactions do produce some funny moments. Galifianakis' oddball antics generally prove to be a highlight, while Helms' freak-outs are perfectly pitched moments of exasperated hysteria ("All I wanted was a bachelor brunch!!!"). There's also Ken Jeong, reprising his role as the gangster Chow, earning solid laughs throughout. Cooper is generally there to be pissed off, rarely given anything actually funny to say or do. As far as "straight men" characters go, there's little that's interesting to him, especially considering what a sleazy jerk he can be. It's the sort of role that I suppose formula demands, but here in particular, it feels noticeable that most of what Cooper says is usually vulgar, without inspiring many laughs (not so for his co-stars).

General reaction to The Hangover Part II has been negative, and in some ways it's easy to see why. Phillips and co. have essentially remade the first movie, only without having to establish as many characters. Taken on its own, Part II probably seems much funnier. Under the shadow of the original, however, it's all a little too familiar, even though it's often amusing and occasionally hilarious. The decision to repeat the formula of the first film does not wreck this sequel. It merely renders its goal - to be a shock and awe campaign of what-just-happened comedy - somewhat diluted.

Grade: C+