"Critics have name-called this film because it’s a satire, a scathing portrayal of everything that is put onscreen, and even the audience that is watching the film. It is, in a way, basic. In the sense that satire always targets those who are up in the scale, so does this film: actors, directors, writers, critics… all people that have some kind of power when compared to the rest of the world. Take the scene where an interestingly dressed character yells, 'this is what the public wants,' to the audience while surrounded by explosions and soldiers. Why don't the people who are sick of superhero blockbusters find some kind of relief or even support in this movie? Here they have their best weapon, not the dumbification of the common people, but actual acknowledgment of the power that the audience has in the movie landscape of today. After all, it is their say, their money, their wanting of seeing the superhero spectacle, that has fueled the industry and made them this always-constant-updating machine of announcements, directors, stars, franchises and crossovers that one must be some kind of wizard to take anything into account and somewhat find any reasoning behind planning movies well into 2019. It is our fault that we have this coming, and dares to tell us: we are the ones to blame.
"Much has been made of the film's supposed lambasting of critics and glorification of actors. But look again - it’s not a love letter to the art of acting, because the acting that it shows in the context of the play is godawful. And they sell it as great acting for the Oscars because it’s in the moments that they’re not in front of the big audience that the performer show off their true chops. While obviously not as masterful as something like Opening Night, one of my favorite movies of all time, it is less self congratulatory by managing to be less scathing. The Cassavetes film ends up being a love letter to performing and female performers, to the joy of living in the theater, and the magic of acting. Iñarritu almost makes a condemnation of the performance, how that action can destroy us, can make us turn and twist and make us the worst person alive, how it can turn our families upside down, how it can destroy your mind, not because it’s the hardest and most important job in the world, no, but because it’s a job that requires for your own soul to be torn apart from what you truly want. Birdman does this by way of glorifying the figure of the ex-superhero, while the self-hating Gena Rowlands ends up with a happier ending (of sorts), in which she finally manages to break her strings.
"It’s been said before in some other places, but I think I need to say it, since it connects so much to my own experience with culture. Birdman feels completely connected with Latin American narrative of the 20th century: Márquez, Carpentier, Borges, Cortázar, and many other exponents of magical realism. These short stories and novels are filled with characters that without any reason start flying, or short stories in which the people reading a book inside the story start to realize that they are in the book themselves. There are direct references at times, like when a sunbathing Edward Norton is seen reading Borges’s short stories. Not many directors could’ve made a movie like Birdman, not because of Iñarritu's virtuosity or even how good of a filmmaker he is (or isn't- the jury is still out for me). Instead, his outsider perspective of show business is the only way that could’ve made it possible for anyone to make this movie the way that it’s made, full of bitterness and spite towards 'the way things are done here.' I won’t call it brave, or even necessary. But damn, if people can’t see the points that I’m making, I don’t know what’s wrong with me." ~ Jaime Grijalba
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