What do we think?
He flys?
He dies?
Reminded me a little a black Swab the climax of this film
I think he just climbed something close to his window and kinda did a funny dance thinking he was flying, but like the taxi scene where he jumps from a building, he is allucinating. His daughter reation could be a "worried but laughing" kind of think.
shareIt sure looked to me like he was flying...
"Did you make coffee? Make it!"--Cheyenne.
He flied. He had powers. He was Birdman.
The whole metaphor of the film is don't forget or let go of anything that makes you great.
He could fly. Believing other people stopped him from flying.
He flew. He could fly and also move objects.
...
Now the trick on the audience is what do you want to believe. If you believe in the tragic movie and the pseudo-beauty of tragedy you will say he died and went to heaven and went mad.
If you believe in the amazing brilliance and power of an individual who is heroic and outstanding - he flew and his daughter was finally happy for him and herself.
The End.
joey-tribbiani - yeah your spot on.
my mind goes with the first suggestion - died on stage and went to heaven!
Mine goes with the flying. Otherwise I don't see the point in him killing himself. I don't get it. What only makes sense at that point is the escapism and that relates to the flying and to escape the theatre which was just too pompous and lower than the greatness he had already achieved.
shareI had a very different take on it - the entire film he is both bemoaning fame yet craving it. He is depressed, he feels like he is "not there". Towards the end the Birdman is feeding him cliche phrases like "60 is the new 30" and stuff about a nose job. When reminded about his former glory days when he had fame and money, "when you were happy", he says "I wasn't happy".
I feel almost like the final scene was another hallucination, his ex-wife and daughter's love, the flowers - but like he couldn't smell the flowers he also couldn't enjoy or appreciate the fame and appreciation his play's eventual success brought. Why would he try to "fly" out the window with all this great stuff going on? He was a depressive, a suicidal, and his daughter looking up is just part of the fantasy of it all.
Genius film. Sad, but brilliant.
"A sword is useless in the hands of a coward" - Nichiren Daishonin
So he was hallucinating her looking up while he was dead?
shareYou have uncovered the problem when people seek clarity from a movie that is phantasmagorical and purposely ambiguous. There is no explaining away the movie like "it was dream" or "he was hallucinating" or "he was mentally ill." The movie has themes, and it is about epxloring those themes. There is no reality to explain away the plot.
shareExcellent point. After reading your comment I can see the entire film as an allegory; the whole backdrop of a stage play a metaphor for perceived vs. actual reality. I especially loved the way Edward Norton's character deliberately blurs that line on stage, and those Lynchian bits with Naomi Watts!
But also, if seen that way, it impresses me more that the final "message", if you will, of the story, is that happiness is not found in fame - that fame is actually a confusing illusion, with the potential to make unhappy people feel even worse about themselves, even more cynical about life itself.
Definitely merits a rewatch - brilliant film!
"A sword is useless in the hands of a coward" - Nichiren Daishonin
Excellent point. After reading your comment I can see the entire film as an allegory; the whole backdrop of a stage play a metaphor for perceived vs. actual reality. I especially loved the way Edward Norton's character deliberately blurs that line on stage, and those Lynchian bits with Naomi Watts!
You have uncovered the problem when people seek clarity from a movie that is phantasmagorical and purposely ambiguous. There is no explaining away the movie like "it was dream" or "he was hallucinating" or "he was mentally ill." The movie has themes, and it is about epxloring those themes. There is no reality to explain away the plot.
I totally get this and agree. There is no "right answer" here.
shareAgreed, glad to see there's at least +/- 1% of imdb posters who also noticed this! I think there is a clear dual reality constructed around the ending though: viewer's choice. One for those inclined to imagine a more happy and "positive" ending (as if he's skipping about on the roof or some such blather), and the other for those who aren't afraid of the dark. Being aware of how we actively partake of these options seems to become the core of the movie's messaging in last that moment though. Take the red pill, take the blue pill.
Both options can have their complications, as the movie well represents. I dangerously wish sometimes that I could go back somehow, to state of more blissful general unawareness.. but.. can't get thar, from here..
My kinda movie. Concept for days. :-)
Very well said, narratology. An ending to satisfy everyone and noone at the same time. Like a movie where they filmed two diferent endings, they couldn't decide which to go with, so they combined them. How fitting given everything that came before.
shareAnd that is why this movie does not have broad appeal. It's a film buffs type of movie that many viewers can't relate to.
shareYou don't see "the point" in his committing suicide, yet he tried it not too long before. What is the point of anybody committing suicide? They are depressed. And if the story showed anything it showed a depressed man. And people who try suicide once are likely to try it again.
shareIt is interresting to see how differently people view the different levels of meaning in a more poetic film like this!
To me, this movie wasn't a pro-individualistidc statement, and the Birdman wasn't a good guy. He was the ego, the pompous part of us who think we as individuals are better and more important than we actually are. There were several hints towards this interpretation: director's daughter, for example, pointing out that he wasn't doing it for art but only to make himself feel more special than he actually is etc. Which, when you think about it, seems to be pretty much correct: he was never worried that the PLAY itself was bad, he was just worried about HIS own legacy, reputation etc. Also when you listen to what the Birdman part of him actually says - that guy doesn't really seem like a genius!
So to me, this wasn't a movie about individual greatness. It was about the madness, the lunacy, that we as individuals posess when we do not work for a greater good (such as to create art and beauty), but only work to elevate our own personalities.
So according to this logic, his madness killed him when he believed he could fly. Then again his daughter looks at him as if he really was flying. Maybe he managed to get rid of his ego which uplifted him? Or maybe the director really WAS making a statement about individual greatness uplifting his spirit, just like you assumed? But if that was the case, why were there so many hints in the movie pointing out how bad it was for us to do this?
The beauty of movies like this is, they can be interpreted in so many ways. And it was the first truly good movie that won the Best Picture Academy Award in YEARS!!!
I think what you say is fine until it gets to the point where the daughter looks up as though he really is flying. I think you're stretching things there. There was something there and he was flying.
I think the most important part of the film is the Barthes reference. Barthes' most important piece of writing is the "The Death of the Author" and it illustrates how the author and what he makes doesn't matter because people, see what they want to see.
In this case, the viewers are seeing what they want to see.
Throughout the film, we see the darkness of the theatre. Terrible, horrid, filled with opinion and self congratulation.
When he leaves the theatre he is alive, people recognise him, say he is amazing and great and important and want to see him again.
Amidst this, there is the sub-plot of superpowers, flying and moving objects.
So the whole film is about how we deny ourselves beauty and amazing things because we are forced greatness by opinion or by social influence.
I think therefore the magic of the film is that Riggan can fly. He has got super powers but just like life, people are pushed down and trodden on and their greatness is suppressed so the fulfil society's needs.
In the end, Riggan embraced the things that other people wanted to end in him.
Spiderman has super powers, Superman flies, Iron Man has a magic suit. We believe these things and suspend our limitations when we see this.
So could Riggan but we are fooled by the director and the script to only believe our own views.
I pity those who see a tragedy and madness. I praise those who see a man flying because they have the ability to see greatness.
I think what you say is fine until it gets to the point where the daughter looks up as though he really is flying.
Hold on a minute there.
His super powers caused him misery?
His daughter saw him flying and she smiled.
The people in the streets saw him and loved him.
The music (we are entering the aesthetics of the film now) when he was birdman was atmospheric and ethereal.
His daughter even said likewise during the film.
The moments related to "Birdman" are all happy moments and pleasant.
Hell, let's relate anything to the theatre. The critic is only happy with misery. The symbolic representation of Ed Norton is misery. The theatre is a mess and dark and miserable and smelly. It is cold and dreary.
The only moments in the film where things shine are related to Birdman, the greatness of it is punched in everybody's face but that's the given as I stated before and in the same way you beg me in your post to see different perspectives merely for the sake of tragedy - that is what the film is about. The horridness of our greatness.
Of course, the film, this film, could have shown the theatre as beautiful and magical but that wasn't the point. If you even listen to Inarritu's narratives he says likewise as well that this is something he toiled with and suffered with.
Now you are trying to ignore everything in this film and give forward this view taht the film is about greatness being seen in multiple interpretations. No... there is nothing in the film that shows that. As your own life philosophy, fine, that is great - good for you but the point of this film is an attack on the elite because nothing in the film. No moment in the film do they penetrate the theatre as beautiful. It is his fall from grace and it is a celebration of cinema.
The beauty of cinema - so let's not forget, we are watching a cinematic film here and we are seeing the most potent symbolism as an attack on the theatre and how broken it is.
I understand what you're saying but it isn't in line with the film at all. For that we do return back to Barthes and Barthes saying that the author is dead and this is at the beginning of the film. If the author is dead the person interprets. If you interpret he dies, he cannot fly that is how tragic the individual has become because he ignores, as you are doing here, you are, ignoring he can fly for misery.
Right? We know that? And your only greatness in this misery is because you want that to be. Just because you want to tag it as greatness but misery isn't great. It never is. We live in a world of mass poverty and inequality and pollution. You have to understand here, you have fallen for this trap where misery is put on a pedestal and you call it great.
Do you know what these kids in ghettos and in slums are doing when they can't eat and are trying to make a life for themselves? Watching Spiderman and Superman and the Avengers and dreaming they can fly and have amazing powers.
Do you want to give them misery because it's great? Mate?
Now, the tragedy of this is, yes, I love tragic films, technically they are amazing - you know what? They are great - so my friend, I see beyond your patronising necessity because I am a film fan... The problem is, that is your dream.
You can't escape it and that's why this film is clever because it mocks the audience and their obsession with tragedy in a world where we want supermen.
If you can see beyond that, fine.
If you are masked in this post-modern dystopia where misery is your friend and identity then this film mocks you.
Congratulations. You were used as a tool, "My friend".
Woah, completely missed your last response...
Anyway, I admit (and I have already admitted) that my version doesn't quite fit in to the big scheme of things. But for reasons mentioned above, neiter does yours. Frankly, it seems to me you are shoe-horning your own almost religion-like philosophy into this interpretation of the movie. You have, of course, the right to do so, since movies are about subjective experiences, but don't expect me to share your philosophy when reviewing films. My post is about the film itself, how the FILM portrayed the characters in different and controversial ways, and not so much about MY personal issues such as wether or not I have misery in my life.
Well this is one of the more unnecessarily passive-aggressive responses I've seen on iMDB for a while...
shareHe conquered Birdman. He flew without Birdman.
shareYes. Plain and simple.
Birdman (ego?) wanted him to keep doing the 'easy' thing, give in, and keep churning out sequels for money. Riggan the man wanted to prove he was more than that, which is why the theater seemed so dark and ugly - so is reality. It's hard work and constantly full of doubt, especially when you give up a sure thing - risking everything you have left of yourself - for something new/untried. When it looked like he was going to lose everything, that the critic was going to kill his play, he basically said 'good-bye' to his ex, did his 'final' scene, and tried to kill himself, turning symbolic death into reality. I think he failed at suicide, woke to rave reviews, accepted that he survived and was happy about it (he'd gotten his ex and his daughter back), said good-bye to Birdman (who was on the toilet and said nothing), and 'flew.'
Absolutely! Our last sighting of Birdman is sitting on the toilet...what? That shows that the film version of Birdman wasn't really capable of anything anymore...just a guy in a costume. Riggan disses the toilet-sitting Birdman, and now he becomes who is has always been capable of being...the flying soul who can soar. Now, Sam finally sees the Dad she's always wanted. In my view, Riggan has flown to the top of the next skyscraper, and that's where Sam sees him. She knows he has flown there and that's what makes her smile.
shareShe saw the ELE meteor heading towards Earth.
Originality needs a reboot.
He committed suicide on stage with the gun, the last scene in the hospital with the broken nose, making up with his daughter, him jumping out the window and his daughter seeing him fly, etc. was all a hallucination.
shareWrong. He actually ended up in the hospital and jumped out of the window. Of course, he didn't actually fly. I believe the daughter saw his body on the ground, but either didn't emotionally process it, or was able mentally block it. She then looked up, saw the ELE meteor heading towards earth, and had the epiphany of the meaningless of fame, money, ego, etc., the absurdity that this fleeting thing we call life really is; hence the awkward little laugh.
For me, Riggan's motivation for jumping is more ambiguous. Did he reach such a lofty state of ego that he actually believed he could fly? Or did he commit suicide, because the fame wasn't what he thought it would be, and he was still depressed?
Originality needs a reboot.
I would say from this perspective that Riggan had achieved all his goals and contentedly "flew" to his death.
shareI think he actually died earlier in the film, when the guy got him off the ledge, then he turned around and "flew" from the rooftop, around the block, and back to the theatre. He imagined everything after that.
shareI agree with jaxi 2005, or he is in a coma.
They said he had blown his nose into pieces with a lot of blood on the audience.
Zach Galifianakis says they will go to the best plastic surgeon available.
When he looks in the mirror his nose is just broken.
What's up with that?
Wrong - he never made it off that beach with the jellyfish.
This film is very Mulholland Dr.-ish - I love it.
the beginning starts with a quote by Raymond Carver. " And did you get what you wanted from this life,even so? I did. And what did you want? To call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the earth." At the end he had achieved his goals. Respected actor,father,husband, and friend. His daughter looking up and smiling was proof he left this earth beloved.
shareI think Sam's attitude or psychology must help in conclusion why she looked down in fear and then looks up and smile. Can anyone throw light or discuss deeply on her character? She is back from rehab, lonely, does the conversation with Mike has any importance? I could not decipher her. If we do that we might know whether it is hallucination from Sam's part or Birdman part or he actually 'flew'.
My view is he did not fly, he fell down.
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I think he flies....but I was disappointed with the ending. Was expecting so much more, but that's the danger on waiting on a heavily promoted film.
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