Birdman

Plot

Riggan Thomson is a faded actor famous for playing a superhero named Birdman in a film trilogy from 1989 to 1992. He is tormented by the mocking and critical internal voice of his past self as Birdman and frequently visualizes himself performing feats of levitation and telekinesis. Riggan is trying to regain recognition by writing, directing, and starring in a Broadway adaptation of Raymond Carver's short story "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love". However, the Birdman voice wants Riggan to return to blockbuster cinema and insists that he is essential to Riggan's identity.

Riggan's best friend and lawyer Jake is producing the play, which co-stars Riggan's girlfriend Laura and Broadway newcomer Lesley. Riggan's daughter Sam, a recovering drug addict with whom he is trying to reconnect, works as his assistant. A light fixture falls onto Riggan's hapless co-star Ralph the day before the first preview. At Lesley's suggestion, Riggan replaces Ralph with her boyfriend, the brilliant but volatile and self-absorbed method actor Mike Shiner.

The first previews are disastrous: Mike breaks character over replacing his gin with water, attempts to rape Lesley during a sex scene, and complains that the prop gun does not look natural. When Riggan berates Sam after finding her smoking marijuana, she insultingly rebukes and chastises him, telling him that he is irrelevant and the play is for his own vanity. Riggan clashes continually with Mike, culminating in a brawl after Riggan reads a New York Times interview with Mike in which he steals Riggan's personal reason for doing a Raymond Carver play. Jake persuades Riggan to continue with the play.

During the final preview, after seeing Mike and Sam kissing backstage, Riggan goes for a smoke and accidentally locks himself outside with his robe stuck in the fire escape door. He is forced to walk through Times Square in his briefs and enter through the audience to begin the final scene. A concerned Sam is waiting in his dressing room after the show, and she thinks the performance was very unusual but interesting. She shows him that the Times Square footage is going viral and explains how this actually helps him.

Riggan goes to a bar for a drink and approaches Tabitha Dickinson, a cynical and highly influential theater critic. She reveals her hatred for him and promises to "kill" his play with a deprecating review without seeing it. On the way back, Riggan buys a pint of whiskey, drinks it, and passes out on a stoop. The next day, walking to the theater with a severe hangover, he visualizes Birdman trying to convince him to abandon the play and make a fourth Birdman film. Riggan then imagines himself flying through the streets of Manhattan before arriving at the theater.

Production

Development

Birdman director Alejandro G. Iñárritu originally conceived the film as a comedy filmed in a single shot set in a theatre. The original choice behind the film's genre, which was subsequently re-adapted to concentrate on Riggan's final emotional tailspin, came from the director wanting to see a change in his approach. All his previous films were dramas, and after directing Biutiful, he did not want to approach his new film in the same tragic manner again. The decision to make the film appear as a single shot came from his realization that "we live our lives with no editing". By presenting the film as a continuous shot, he could "submerge the protagonist in an 'inescapable reality' and take the audience with him". Iñárritu shared his idea with the Argentine screenwriters/cousins Nicolás Giacobone and Armando Bo, as well as playwright Alexander Dinelaris Jr., who had all worked with him on Biutiful. Their first reaction was to tell him the continuous-shot idea could not work. According to Dinelaris and Giacobone, "huge" and "important" people told him to not even try the project for the same reason. Iñárritu himself described the technique as "almost suicidal", worrying that it would be distracting, instead of immersive. Dinelaris later said that had they truly paused and considered the idea, they might have talked Iñárritu out of it.

The personal and vocational experiences of the four co-writers were central to writing the script. Dinelaris' exposure to Broadway shaped the depictions of rehearsals and events backstage, though he admitted exaggerating these. He also felt his background writing long scenes of dialogue helped since scenes in the film "were really more like play scenes". Iñárritu's own experiences influenced many of Birdman's themes. "What this film talks about, I have been through", Iñárritu recalled. "I have seen and experienced all of it; it's what I have been living through the last years of my life." Dinelaris described this aspect as "a laughing look at oneself", but said it had to be done in a comedic way; otherwise, "it would have been the most unbelievably self-absorbed look at the subject". Themes from Raymond Carver's short story "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love", which Riggan adapts for stage in the story, also influenced the script. Iñárritu wanted to find the connection between the themes in Riggan's story and those of Carver's. Because of this, it was important to the director that Carver's story be the subject of the play depicted within the film. Therefore, Iñárritu stated that his desire to use Carver's work was "terrifying" because the rights to using the Carver material were still subject to the possibility of being rejected during development of the film, but no issues arose. Carver's widow, writer Tess Gallagher, loved the script and permitted the adaptation, saying that Carver would be laughing about the film.

Casting

Iñárritu cast several of the leading roles before the film was financed. Among these was the lead role. Early in script development, Iñárritu did not have Keaton in mind, but he had changed his mind by the end: "When I finished the script, I knew that Michael was not the choice or option, he was the guy". Iñárritu cast Keaton for his depth in a variety of acting styles: He could handle the demands of the stage, up-close work, and comedy and empathy "with a profound depth to both".

Keaton knew about Birdman before Iñárritu contacted him. He was in the middle of production of another project when he learned that Iñárritu was making another film. Keaton, a fan of his work, flew home to find out more. Iñárritu sent him the script and they discussed it over dinner. The first thing Keaton asked Iñárritu was whether he was making fun of him (regarding his role in Tim Burton's Batman films), but after Iñárritu explained the role, its technicalities, and the film's production, Keaton agreed to play Riggan. Despite this, the final film contains numerous references to Burton's Batman films, including the year Riggan is mentioned to have last played Birdman being 1992.

Iñárritu called his decision behind casting Galifianakis as Jake "a bet". Galifianakis met Iñárritu's criteria of being lovable and funny, but Iñárritu also considered him sensitive, which scored him the role. Emma Stone already knew she wanted to work with Iñárritu before she was offered the role of Sam. The script that Iñárritu gave her and the rest of the cast came with the photo Man on Wire, which featured Philippe Petit crossing the Twin Towers on a tightrope. Iñárritu told the cast, "We are doing that".

Once these actors were committed, Iñárritu sought funding. He first invited Fox Searchlight Pictures to finance the project, but they turned his offer down because they felt his asking budget was too high. At one stage Megan Ellison of Annapurna Pictures wanted to be involved in the project, but decided against it because, unlike her other films, she had not been involved since the beginning. Iñárritu approached Brad Weston, president of New Regency, who accepted the offer. When executive Claudia Lewis of Searchlight heard about the deal, she reconsidered and asked to be included in the deal. Searchlight and New Regency had previously worked together to finance 12 Years a Slave, and they decided to join together for Birdman, financing a budget of $16.5 million.

Rehearsal and filming

Once the writing was finished, Iñárritu contacted friend and cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki to discuss his idea for the film. After reading the script, Lubezki was worried that Iñárritu would offer him the job since Birdman "had all of the elements of a movie that I did not want to do at all" – comedy, studio work and long takes – but changed his mind after further discussion with the director. The pair had worked together on commercials and a short film in the anthology To Each His Own Cinema, but not on any feature films. Lubezki wanted to be sure that this was a decision Rodrigo Prieto, cinematographer of all four of Iñárritu's feature films, was comfortable with, but after receiving his blessing, the two headed into pre-production.

Lubezki was concerned that no film had been shot in the way Iñárritu envisioned, meaning there would be no reference material to look up. The two decided the only way to learn how to shoot it would be to shoot it themselves, so they built a proxy stage at Sony Studios in Los Angeles. The setup was minimal. Canvas and C-stands were used for walls, while tape and a few pieces of furniture marked out areas. Using a camera and some stand-ins, the duo worked through the movie to see if it was possible. Realizing no theatre could accommodate the intricate camerawork they needed, they hired Kaufman Astoria Studios in New York. Still, Iñárritu wanted to shoot at a Broadway theater, but would have to wait until several weeks into rehearsals before securing St. James Theatre. They then spent a few months designing and making "blueprints" of the shots and blocking the scenes, using the stand-ins to read and walk through the script. The planning was precise. Iñárritu said: "There was no room to improvise at all. Every movement, every line, every door opening, absolutely everything was rehearsed." The actors started rehearsing once this preliminary work was completed: According to Lubezki, they did the scenes with the actors "once we kind of knew what the rhythm of the scenes were". He described the atypical approach "like an upside down movie where you do post-production before the production".

Editors Douglas Crise and Stephen Mirrione were involved in the project by this stage. When Iñárritu told Mirrione that he planned for Lubezki to record table readings and the rehearsals, he suggested they edit them immediately to discover what was and was not working early on. The editing also allowed the editors to discuss pacing issues with the director, such as the position of the night-day transitions and other moments of rest in the film. Production designer Kevin Thompson was on hand too, and mapped out the scenes. The camerawork required many elements of the set to be built in a certain way. For example, Riggan's makeup mirror and desk were constructed so that the camera would see his reflection. Thompson also took into consideration the needs of the crew, for instance designing the stairs a little wider for Steadicam operator Chris Haarhoff's footsize.

Music and soundtrack

The film's original music segments are a drum score consisting entirely of solo jazz percussion performances by Antonio Sánchez. The score is offset by a number of well-known classical music pieces, including Mahler and Tchaikovsky. Iñárritu did not regard the particular choice of classical pieces as important. Nonetheless, the choice of classical music was strongly oriented to highly melodic scores taken predominantly from the 19th century classical repertoire (Mahler, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Ravel). Iñárritu stated that the classical components come from the world of the play, citing the radio in Riggan's room and the show itself as two sources of the music. The classical music segments also included two compositions by American composer John Adams. Several jazz compositions by Victor Hernández Stumpfhauser and Joan Valent counterbalance the original music composition by Sánchez. The drum sections comprise the majority of the score, however, and were composed by Sánchez. Iñárritu explained the choice by saying they helped to structure scenes, and that "The drums, for me, was a great way to find the rhythm of the film... In comedy, rhythm is king, and not having the tools of editing to determine time and space, I knew I needed something to help me find the internal rhythm of the film."

Iñárritu contacted friend and jazz drummer Antonio Sánchez in January 2013, inviting him to compose the score for the film. His reaction to writing a soundtrack using only drums was similar to Lubezki's thoughts of shooting the movie like a single shot: "It was a scary proposition because I had no point of reference of how to achieve this. There's no other movie I know that has a score like this." Sánchez had also not worked on a film before, nevertheless, after receiving the script, he composed "rhythmic themes" for each of the characters. Iñárritu was looking for the opposite approach, however, preferring spontaneity and improvisation. Sánchez then waited until production moved to New York before composing more, where he visited the set for a couple of days to get a better idea of the film. Following this, a week before principal photography, he and Iñárritu went to a studio to record some demos. During these sessions the director would first talk him through the scene, then while Sánchez was improvising guide him by raising his hand to indicate an event – such as a character opening a door – or by describing the rhythm with verbal sounds. They recorded around seventy demos, which Iñárritu used to inform the pacing of the scenes on set, and once filming was complete, spliced them into the rough cut. Sánchez summarized the process by saying, "The movie fed on the drums, and the drums fed on the imagery". The official soundtrack was released as a CD (77 min) in October 2014, and as an LP (69 min) in April 2015.

Post-production and visual effects

The film was edited by Douglas Crise and Stephen Mirrione, who had both worked with the director before on 21 Grams and Babel. Stitching shots together was a crucial component of the editing, but Crise and Mirrione already had experience doing this. The director had included takes that were joined together in previous films, but in these if the editors did not think the stitching worked, they had the ability to introduce cuts. Mirrione said that in Birdman, Iñárritu had "let go of that safety net". Because of this the editors needed to be involved in the project early on, and during principal photography Crise was on set every day. (Mirrione was busy and unable to be in New York.) Crise was not used to being on set and providing feedback, but said he was happy Iñárritu "dragged it out" of him, knowing that they would not have much room to fix scenes later so they needed to get them right. For stitching, aside from the director, Crise also discussed strategies with Lubezki and Thompson, and techniques for gluing takes together included panning on walls and actors' bodies. The editors were used to being able to adjust the rhythm of a scene by the positioning of cuts, so without this tool used Sánchez's music instead. The director gave the New York recordings to Crise early on to help with pacing, asking him to cut the music to the film. Still, in terms of the editing workflow, Crise described it as "pretty traditional". The editors cut the film together back in Los Angeles. A few weeks after shooting, they were quite far along the cut itself, and transitioned into visual-effects mode, where they fine-tuned the shots.

The visual effects for the film were created by Montreal based studio Rodeo FX. They spent four months working on the film, and according to visual effects supervisor Ara Khanikian "visual effects touched 90% of the frames in the movie". A lot of the work was subtle, such as stitching shots together, or creating the background for the windows in the hospital scene. Many shots in the film feature mirrors, and much work was spent removing the reflections of the crew from these. To accomplish this the studio created a 2.5D digital matte painting of the reflected environment. They then rotoscoped out the parts of the mirror not containing the foreground actors and their reflections, and replaced these with the digital environment. Some of the original shots captured smudges and dirt on the mirrors, so the studio developed a way to extract them so they could paste them back into the film. A matte-painting was constructed for the night-day time lapses in the film too, created by matchmoving and reprojecting shots of the buildings it features, captured at different times of the day, together. Rodeo FX also adjusted the pace of scenes. Iñárritu demanded a "very precise rhythm and flow" to the film, so the studio had to re-speed much of it with timewarp curves to fit the pacing the director desired.

Analysis and themes

Iñárritu has emphasized and defended the various ambiguities intentionally included in the film: "At the ending of the film, [it] can be interpreted as many ways as there are seats in the theater." Many aspects of film theory were debated concerning the film by critical reviews which included, among other subjects, (a) film genre; (b) intended and unresolved ambiguities of plot; and (c) the complex interaction of Riggan's personal life with his professional life as an actor. A short list of the diverse forms of film genre associated with the film has included it being referred to alternatively as a black-humor film, a mental health film, a realism/surrealism/magical realism film, a dark-humor parody film, a film of psychological realism, a failed domestic reconciliation drama, or a film concerning theatrical realism and naturalism. Iñárritu has maintained his penchant, well-known to followers of his previous films, for deliberately including multiple plot lines in this film which are intentionally left unresolved at the ending. Separate reviews in the press have also summarized the film as closely associated with the theme of the final tailspin of a late mid-life crisis in the life of a has-been actor seeking closure and resolution in his public and private life.

The father-daughter themes in the film, portrayed through the relationship of Riggan and Samantha, were the "most difficult" and important parts of the film to depict for co-writers Dinelaris and Giacobone, as they both had similar experiences within their families involving their own relationships with their daughters. When the writers were asked about the meaning of the ambiguous ending which the director refused to comment upon, they stated that any comedic ending was completely ruled out. The writers also stated that reflections about the conclusion to the film were not directly concentrated upon Riggan or the character of Birdman as much as upon the lives of the surviving characters portrayed in the film, in particular the portrayal of Riggan's daughter Samantha.

Noting the thematic pull between Riggan's insanity or actual superpowers, Travis LaCouter of First Things writes that "the importance of these powers – real or imagined – is apparent: They are for Riggan the thing beyond the labels, the kernel of his genius and, because he sees drawing upon them as selling out, the source of his great angst." LaCouter concludes that "the quirky profundity of this film is in how it dares the viewer to consider the everyday magic that we tend to ignore, repress, or resent".

Release and reception

Birdman was selected as the opening film of the 71st Venice International Film Festival along with Mohsen Makhmalbaf's new film. A limited release began in four North American theatres on October 17, 2014, followed by a nationwide release in 857 theatres on November 14, 2014.

Box office

Birdman grossed $42.3 million in North America and $60.9 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $103.2 million, against a budget of about $17 million.

The film earned $424,397 during its limited North America opening in four theatres in New York and Los Angeles on the weekend of October 17, 2014, a per-theater average of $106,099, making it the 18th all-time earner (eighth among live-action movies) and ranking No. 20. In the second weekend of October 24, 2014, Birdman expanded to 50 theaters and earned $1.38 million, which translates to a $27,593 per-theater average. The film expanded nationwide to 857 theaters in the weekend of November 14, 2014, grossing $2,471,471, with a per theatre average of $2,884, and ranking No. 10. In the same weekend, Birdman grossed $11.6 million.

The film opened in Mexico on November 13, 2014, grossing $628,915 in its opening weekend, and opened in the United Kingdom on January 2, 2015, grossing $2,337,407 over the weekend. In the United Kingdom, Australia, and Italy, the film grossed $7.6 million, $3.97 million, and $1.97 million, respectively.

Critical response

On review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, Birdman holds an approval rating of 91%, based on 351 reviews, and an average rating of 8.50/10. The website's critical consensus reads: "A thrilling leap forward for director Alejandro González Iñárritu, Birdman is an ambitious technical showcase powered by a layered story and outstanding performances from Michael Keaton and Edward Norton." On Metacritic, the film received a weighted average score of 87 out of 100, based on 58 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A−" on an A+ to F scale. In 2015, the film was named as one of the top 50 films of the decade so far by The Guardian.

Margaret Pomeranz and David Stratton from At the Movies praised the film's writing, direction, performances and cinematography. Stratton also described the implementation of the percussion score as "really exciting", while Pomeranz summarised: "It's just really beautifully written and stunningly performed and beautifully made." The pair both gave the film five stars, making Birdman the only film to receive such a rating from the hosts in 2014. In The New York Times, Manohla Dargis compared the main character to Icarus, the Greek mythological figure who crashed to his death after flying too close to the sun. She also noted a reference to Susan Sontag's Against Interpretation in the dressing-room mirror.

Richard Kolker compared the film to both Alfred Hitchcock's Rope (1948) and Alexander Sokurov's Russian Ark (2002). Kolker concludes that Birdman is "a film about acting, identity, transformation, and the mysterious effects of superheroes, (and) is filmed to create the illusion of being made in one continuous take. As with Rope, the edits are hidden, and the result is a rhythmic slide through the life of an actor in search of his self, a search doomed from the start." Ollie Cochran called the film "an amalgam of technical prowess, hypnotising visuals and pragmatically perceptive dialogue", believing it to be "a thought-provoking, energetic perspective of a fading actor looking to revitalise his career."

International reception of the film was also at a high level of praise. In Germany, a film aggregate rating at EPD Film gave the film a 3.4 out of 5 rating, based on seven critiques. The German critic Barbara Schweizerhof gave the film a 4 out of 5 possible stars, complimenting the director's satirical virtuosity in making the film. In her review, Schweizerhof spoke of the film as inviting the viewer to re-watch it "a second and third time", and praised the technical achievement of representing a storyline depicting "the feverish stream of consciousness" of its main character throughout the film.

Accolades

At the 87th Academy Awards, Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) won four Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Cinematography. Michael Keaton was nominated for Best Actor, Edward Norton and Emma Stone were nominated for Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress respectively, and it also received nominations for Best Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing.

Keaton received his first Golden Globe Award, winning for Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy at the 72nd Golden Globe Awards. The film also won the Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay.

In 2021, members of Writers Guild of America West (WGAW) and Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE) voted its screenplay 51st in WGA’s 101 Greatest Screenplays of the 21st Century (So Far). In 2025, it was one of the films voted for the "Readers' Choice" edition of The New York Times' list of "The 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century," finishing at number 114.

Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) was listed on many critics' top ten lists.