Birdman
 

Other than Michael Keaton's acting, does anyone else think that Birdman was a strange and weird movie that was way over-rated? I am baffled at how they determined this as best picture. I guess Hollywood and the movie critics are too sophisticated for us regular movie goers. On a scale of 1-10, I gave Birdman a 1, and that's only for Keaton's acting. (And yes, I did understand the movie, just did not like it.)

We are about to watch the movie tonight. We are looking forward to it. Seeing that you rated it a 1 on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being the worst movie ever made leads me to believe your view somewhat conflicts with the 10 the Academy Awards gave it. It is possible your view is extreme. I will check back here with the opinions of our group of four, my wife and me, and my son and his wife, after our viewing.

Birdman
 

I wouldn't give it a 1, but I wouldn't give it a 10 either. I thought the Academy rating it so high was a bit because it was so much about their own industry. A bit self-gratifying if you ask me.

I'd give it about a 6, maybe a 7.

For the last few years my wife and I have AVOIDED the pictures that are highly rated and ones that receive many Academy awards due to the fact when we used to go see these Highly awarded movies they typically STUNK! I have often wondered what planet the people that choose these winning flicks come from! However, I was intrigued by this Birdman movie since Michael Keaton has been out of sight for so many years and enjoyed his work in years past. If we go to see it soon I as well will post our thoughts on the flick!

Watched this movie last night on Pay-Per-View and have to agree with the OP--some great acting but certainly not an academy award winning best picture of the year. I would also rate it 1 on a scale of 1-10.

Session Timeout - Academy Awards® Database - AMPAS

Some of the best pictures chosen by Academy members are extremely entertaining and are quite deep in terms of literary like merit. Forrest Gump, Braveheart, Unforgiven, even Rocky.

I have not seen Birdman yet but it probably has layers to it. I mean that it is attractive to different groups of audiences due to how they respond to it like great works of art.

We watched it last night and sorry, but I would have to give it a 1 too. It was all I could do just to watch it all.

We watched the movie last night and the OP's rating of 1 doesn't look so extreme now. My wife rated it a 1 as well. My son said he wouldn't rate it, but had he read a description of the movie he would not have watched it. My daughter-in-law didn't watch it as she had an active three year old to care for, and I gave it a 6. The movie certainly had artistic merits, but it was more of a Hollywood King Lear than a Death of a Salesman.

Birdman a 10
 

We watched Birdman the other night and it was our favorite movie of the year! We loved it!

It does sound like a movie that would appeal to me. Of the movies I have seen in 2014, I liked Guardians of the Galaxy the most. But Birdman looks like something I would like just because of my own experiences.

Layers? Possibly so. But if we pay money to go see a movie we expect to be entertained and not leave confused while leaving the theatre, or worse have to leave because the story line is so excruciating that it hurts to keep watching! We are probably just Simple people!

They just did not want American Sniper to win. Perhaps Birdman may appeal to some but clearly Sniper appealed to many more.

Villagerjack, I agree with you. My husband and I watched "Boyhood" on PPV because we had heard so many good things about it. In the middle of the film I left the room to fold clothes from the dryer. I was that interested! I'm grateful for the "Birdman" reviews. We'll wait for Netflix for this one.

Hollywood has an agenda, and it's not the agenda of the audience of American Sniper--people who blame the terrorists instead of our military for the evil and butchery spreading and already here.

Spot on. Well said.

???? Please say you don't actually believe that.

SPOILER ALERT


When Sam returns, Riggan is gone. She looks down at the street, then up at the sky and smiles.

I enjoyed and I think understood the movie except for the ending.
He pretended or was delusional about having supernatural powers. Right? Why did Sam look up and smile?

Was Riggan imagining that Sam looked out the window?

I don't recall seeing a movie before where the cameraman was constantly walking backwards. It seemed like sometimes the person of interest would hand off the cameraman to the next person of interest beginning the next scene. And they would start moving. It felt like a roller coaster.

I saw Birdman rather late, after they had brought it back for a second run at Spanish Springs sometime in January. The theater was packed and about an hour into the movie I was still wondering why people would say this was so great. It was different but that doesn't always mean it's good.

At about the one hour mark, Birdman returns to his dressing room and begins to thrash it about, throwing things here and there and dropping the F word over and over. The couple in front of us, got up and left, they were the only ones but I could see why they didn't like what was on the screen.

The next hour of the film Birdman started to do more of his supernatural effects plus the getting locked out in the alley scene in which he has to walk blocks around the theater to get back in, wearing just his underwear. Now, you'll understand why they did that routine at the Academy Awards, it was a take-off on that scene.

The second hour the film went from a 6 to an 8 in my movie scoring. It became a really good film and lifted the entire movie to a greater height. My only regret was the couple in front of us missed something really good. In comparison, I guess it came across kind of artsy in the way that Brokeback Mountain came across.

I gave Birdman an 8 but I gave American Sniper a 10, so I guess they did pick the wrong film to win.

I did a little research and the ending is confusing to everyone. There are a few different theories about how it could be interpreted.
And the same goes for the movie itself.

Because the ending is ambiguous, I don't know if I like the movie anymore.

When I hear the directors intention I may think differently.

click here

For all the hype and great (overall) Amazon reviews, I thought it a marginally good movie at best. The drums in the background were very annoying.

Hollywood is more diverse than many people think. Just google Republican actors and actresses. They may be less outspoken than their liberal counterparts but they are still there. Kind of like saying the Villages is just Republicans, there are Democrats here too but we keep in our shells more.

I saw the first half but was busy with other stuff so I returned it to Redbox.

It does seem like a movie that professional and amateur actors could relate to the most. I will try to get to the 2nd half sometime soon.

I finally got around to watching all of Birdman and found it quite deep overall but not as good as American Sniper. I will assume that the people on TOTV in 2065 will be having the same kind of conversation about these two films. They should last in other words.

I did not watch the Academy Awards unfortunately. :(