Thighs Wide Shut

Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
Breaking The Fifth Wall
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 119 min

Alejandro González Iñárritu‘s Birdman is be like…

–

Michael Keaton is an actor who was once a superhero

and now is like nothing or something

&

a superhero kinda like Condorman

&

his daughter is Emma Stone

who’s like a strung out/sarcastic Daisy Duck

&

Keaton’s trying to put on a Broadway show
in hopes of reviving his career

but it kinda goes like The Producers
with Zach Galifianakis as the hybrid lovechild
of Zero Mostel & Gene Wilder

&

one of his costars is a jerky Ed Norton
who’s out to spoil all the fun
and steal the spotlight

(and Andrea Riseborough is kinda doing the same thing)

which makes it feel a little About Eve

&

the fragile Naomi Watts is about to break

&

all of it seems like one giant artistical battle
like totally like Black Swan yo!

but not nearly as freaky or freakin awesome

&

but its got shades of the creative long-take editing of
Hitch’s BRILLIANT Rope

&

the even more creative and longer takes of
Alfonso Cuaron’s BRILLIANT Children of Men

&

luckily Amy Ryan is our center of gravity
and source of comfort

so what does it all add up to? an interesting movie with great technique, with a story that kinda grows old after an hour

glad to see Keaton back in action, but Oscars??? psssshah – this aint no Bettlejuice, or even Johnny Dangerously, so if he wins this year, it’s a make-up call for not winning for them roles

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Birdman is fly enuff in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Biutiful
A Lesson, A Kiss, A Prayer & 86 Other Things Before Dying
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

21 Grams, Babel, and Amores Perros are three hauntingly excellent films that we’d never want to sit thru the pain of again.  Thanks, or no thanks, Mr Alejandro González Iñárritu!!  How bout making a happy film about humanity for once????  Guess you’re incapable of doing so, and even if yer latest Biutiful is one ugly mother, and not necessarily as potent as the three mentioned above, we’ll still take it, cause pretty movies are for sissies, and are released in the summer. At least Mr Iñárritu isn’t going anymore global than he did in Babel, cause where else could he go to contemplate man’s deficiencies, Uranus?

All the action and in-action of Biutiful occurs in one place (Barcelona), but the communication breakdown remains the same.  This time we gots Spanish thugs & cops & thuggish cops trying to take down and keep in bidness Chinese sweatshop owners who create knock off goods for Senegalese street vendors to peddle.  In the middle of it all is the complex character of Uxbal (Javier Bardem, our mos flavorite actor going, and the real reason to see this).  He’s got a whore of a wife (Maricel Álvarez, but who would touch this woman, even for free???), who sleeps with his brother, a cad who wants to sell their already buried father’s gravesite real estate for cash, and when Uxbal’s not out micromanaging the Chinese and the Senegalese folk, he’s got two kids (Hanaa Bouchaib and Guillermo Estrella, a lil bit more adorable than the Focker kids) to tend to.  Oh, did we mention that ole Uxy can talk to the dead AND juss found out that he’s gonna die within a few months on top of all this sense-non?????  What, you were expecting a walk in the park?  Expect a kick in the groin!!  Iñárritu much???  Maybe not enough!!!

Wait For It: there’s a scene in a strip club where the women have nipples on their butts, and it’s kinda creepy, and it’s also kinda hot, and since the internet is failing us right now, we can only tell and not show.  sorry

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Biutiful is full in NY/LA on December 29th, and elsewhere January 28th!

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…