A listing of Inarritu's Top 5 films
By Pallavi Tripathi
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| Leonardo DiCaprio in Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's The Revenant |
"I think that in order to be a film director, one has to be a warrior who shouldn't be defeated by the daily onslaught of problems. We are all hanging by threads and are the mercy of various elements; if one fails the whole flight could come crashing down, and like a good warrior I'm not going to break down."-Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu
Receiving the Oscar for best director last year, the second
Mexican to ever do so, this warrior was in full glory. Birdman, being the great
film that it is, wasn't his first to be nominated for the Academy. In fact, all
of his feature length movies have been nominated for Oscars in at least one
category. His alliance with fellow Mexican directors Alfonso Cuaron (first Mexican
to win best director Oscar) and Guillermo del Torro has led to the formation of
'Cha cha cha films' productions. This production made Biutiful (Spanish for
Beautiful), directed by Alejandro. Not only did it received the Academy's nod
and critics’ praises but won Javier Bardem (movie's lead) the best actor award
at Cannes.
Alejandro's style is more 'magical naturalism' by which I
mean his movies give a maturely sensitive depiction of humans. He captures the
flaws with rays of hope in each character. The strings that wake them up and
the strings that make them do what they do. For, humans are complicated,
multidimensional creatures, and, in his movies, it is depicted with poetic
honesty. Honesty that makes the audience accept if not love the characters. His
movies talk about injustices but it has no villains. It looks at injustice in a
philosophically ripped manner. The manner society brings it—discrimination,
human connection beyond borders and in that way he portrays world as a global
village and tries to identify what separates us and what unites us. This could
be due to him crossing the Atlantic Ocean on a cargo ship at the age of 16 and
18, working his way across Europe and Africa. He has noted that these early
travels as a young man have had a great influence on him as a filmmaker.
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's first feature length film was
Amores Perros, first of his anthologized 'Death trilogy' followed by 21 Grams
and Babel. It could be considered as one of the best trilogies of cinema
history. Even though Birdman brought him the international accolades winning
him several Oscars, his Biutiful is probably his masterpiece, which is a
poetically tragic tale of a dying man. He has said in an occasion: “My cinema
is an extension of myself. A sort of life-testimony of my vital experience with
my few virtues and my numerous limitations.”
A lot is being anticipated of Innaritu's upcoming The Revenant.
The most prominent being the Best Actor Oscar for Leonardo DiCaprio, who has
been famously nominated for the award numerous times never winning. Innaritu
thus far has directed eight Academy Award-nominated performances: Michael Keaton,
Naomi Watts, Edward Norton, Benicio Del Toro, Adriana Barraza, Rinko Kikuchi,
Emma Stone and Javier Bardem, none of which has won. Whether this record
breaks, it remains to be seen.
Before you prepare yourself for The Revenant, here's a listing
of this warrior's movies:-
5). 21 Grams (2003)
This movie is the second installment
of Innaritu’s ‘Death trilogy’ and like the other two it is also an anthology
film. The three main characters of the movie are played by Sean Penn, Naomi
Watts and Benicio del Toro. Penn plays a critically ill mathematician having a
faulty heart, Watts plays a grief-stricken mother who has lost her husband and
two children in an accident, and Del Tore plays a born-again Christian
ex-convict whose faith is sorely tested in the aftermath of the accident that
killed Watts’ family. The three main characters each have “past,” “present,”
and “future” story threads, which are shown as non-linear fragments that
punctuate elements of the overall story, all imminently coming toward each
other and becomes whole as the story progresses. What comes strongly as a theme
of this movie is a feeling of redemption and loss and gain of faith. Watts’s
performance as a grieving mother and wife is heart-breaking and del Toro as a
man in redemption is believable although sometimes the movie is hard to
catch-up on.
4) Amores Perros (2000)
It’s English translation ‘Love is a bitch’ was
heavily used during the marketing of the film, although it was released as
Amores Perros in English too. It won Innaritu his first Academy nomination,
being his first feature length film, as it was nominated in the Foreign Films
category. The movie links three stories through an accident. It explores deeply
the themes of inequality and violence but film’s theme is loyalty, as
symbolized by dogs, “man’s best friend”, which plays the central role in the
film. The film has three hyperlink stories and dogs are important to the main
characters in each of the three stories, and in each story various forms of
human loyalty or disloyalty are shown: disloyalty to a brother by trying to
seduce the brother’s wife, disloyalty to a wife by keeping a mistress with
subsequent disloyalty to the mistress when she is injured and loses her beauty,
loss of loyalty to youthful idealism and rediscovered loyalty to a daughter as
a hit-man falls from and then attempts to regain grace.
3) Birdman (2014)
3) Birdman (2014)
Innaritu became the part of elite group of directors who have won Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay for the same film. With the likes of Francis Ford Coppola, Leo McCarey, Billy Wilder, James L. Brooks, Peter Jackson, and Coen Brothers it is a great group to be in. The beauty of the movie is in its editing, it is one of the most innovative editing in the recent times. Birdman brings a substantial satire on the modern contemporary society, whether it’s our obsession with superheroes or social media which is, as shown in the movie, deeply linked to our question of existence and an insatiable ego. The story follows Riggan Thomson (Keaton), a faded Hollywood actor best known for playing the superhero “Birdman”, who also has a very complicated personal life and his relationship with any human professionally or personally is thorny. He struggles to mount a Broadway adaptation of a short story by Raymond Craver. The father-daughter relationship is pictured with brutal honesty and is heart breaking.
2) Babel (2006)
Babel is the most matured of the ‘Death Trilogy’ and what
comes strongly as a theme of the movie is a sense of family and what and how
much people from all over the world do to protect it and keep it intact. Since
the movie portrays multiple stories taking place in Morocco, Japan, and
Mexico/U.S.A, through four stories it establishes one of the things that unites
all humans is a sense of family. It sensitively portrays the issue of Mexican
refugees in USA and tries to capture the effect geo-politics plays in human
relations. Babel captures the flaws and beauty of family all over the world.
Mixed with amazing sound editing, direction and brilliant performances of the
likes of Cate Blanchett and Rinko kikuchi it is one of the best if not the best
movie of 2006. It was whole heartedly received by the Academy as it was
nominated in several categories including the Best motion picture, Best
direction, Best Screenplay and won for Best Original score for movie. One can
see the hard work involved in the process of making these movies as it not only
involves characters of various culture and language but gives them a
substantial screen space and have valuable roles in the movies. It is
Innaritu’s brilliance that makes the movie flow smoothly and make it look
effortless.
1) Biutiful (2010)
Alejandro
Gonzalez’s best work till date is Biutiful as is evident from filmmakers Sean
Penn, Werner Herzog and Michael Mann’s outspoken support for the film. While
Herzog likened it to a “poem,” Penn compared Bardem’s performance to that of
Marlon Brando’s in Last Tango in Paris. Not only was Bardem’s performance the
first entirely Spanish-language performance to be nominated for the Academy but
it also won him Best Actor Award at Cannes. The film is a poetically tragic
journey of a man who is diagnosed with prostate Cancer. Uxbal is a father of
two and is separated from his bipolar disorder affected wife, who can barely
keep it together. The movie very sensitively portrays his professional life,
which involves dealing with illegal (read black people) who deal with drugs,
allowing them to find work by dealing with police. It also involves him dealing
with chinese wherein human trafficking is probably involved and how it crumbles
down just like his life due to cancer. It is brave and bold in its portrayal and
performance and is filled with some raw scenes that can make you cringe in your
seats! It is an artwork of highest degree that shouldn’t be missed.
About Author -
Pallavi sees herself as wanderer, wannabe writer and wannabe everything moviebuff! She is a firm believer of magic of movies and remains high on movies constantly.
Readers, please feel free to share your views/opinions in the comment box below. As always your feedback is highly appreciated!
The Revenant (2015) Trailer (YouTube)
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Readers, please feel free to share your views/opinions in the comment box below. As always your feedback is highly appreciated!
The Revenant (2015) Trailer (YouTube)
Previous Post: Sicario (2015)
Next Post: Pan (2015)
Complete List of Reviews
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