Biutiful

Pondering life and death in the midst of dingy imagery appears to be a favourite activity of filmmaker Alejandro González Iñárritu, so it's impossible for me to accuse him of lacking passion for the subject that he once more explores in the dreary drama Biutiful. But while passion is in abundance, a point to all this gloomy nonsense remains arbitrarily absent. The story of conflicted father Uxbal (Javier Bardem), who can occasionally speak to the dead and help shepherd their souls into the afterlife, is one filled with pain, sadness, regret, and the possibility of forgiveness, but in the hands of Iñárritu, these themes are overwrought clichés.

Uxbal's world, restricted to the seedier sides of Barcelona, is as grimy in its geography as it is in its morality. Since talking to dead people doesn't bring in a lot of money, Uxbal makes the majority of his income by negotiating labour for poor immigrant workers and then taking a cut from their pay. He has a group of Chinese workers who spend their time sewing together cheap purses and another group from Senegal who sell the merchandise on the street. Judging by the dilapidated condition of Uxbal's apartment, this particular line of work doesn't exactly rake in money, either, but he manages to get by.

Complicating his life is the responsibility of raising his two children almost entirely on his own, since his bipolar wife Marambra (Maricel Álvarez) is more interested in partying than parenting. Nothing much seems to go right for Uxbal and so it isn't all too surprising when he receives some nasty news about his current state of health. This is Iñárritu's story, after all, so things are destined to only get worse. More tragedy follows and Uxbal's journey continues to dip into the darkness. Along the way, he finds little to smile about and a whole lot of reasons to look really serious and upset.

Iñárritu wouldn't want it any other way. His desire to dig into every depressing corner of Uxbal's existence is rendered almost comical by his refusal (or inability) to find any semblance of dramatic balance in the story. He is so insistent on wallowing in the sadness that he prevents the movie from achieving any kind of emotional complexity. If everything is all bad all the time, then there is no juxtaposition of experience and the story simply flat-lines in the midst of such melodramatic mayhem. Iñárritu's fascination with the grungy underbelly of the human condition is somewhat intriguing on its own, but his execution is one-sided and therefore lacks dimension.

Despite the transparency of Iñárritu's intentions and the simplicity of his filmic philosophy, Bardem still presents a very solid performance. My problems with the movie do not extend to Bardem's work, even though his dedication to the role only feeds Iñárritu's self-important silliness. Always watchable, Bardem has a powerful presence that is equal parts tender and intimidating. This combination may not be used to its fullest potential here, but at least Bardem's talents lend some dramatic weight to the movie. The rest of the cast fare well, too, but they're all ultimately swallowed up by Iñárritu's vision.

Nearly every character in the movie has their face hovering just inches away from the gutter, so there isn't much room for the actors to breathe. Iñárritu is in full control here and he ensures that the various character arcs, well, don't have any actual arc. He keeps hurling horrible heaps of conflict at the characters in hopes that some profound statement about life and love and tragedy will reveal itself. But he doesn't really come up with anything that is particularly convincing or profound, which is especially irritating given how much energy he pours into the attempt over a period of almost two-and-a-half hours.

Iñárritu's obsession with the seamy side of life is at least handled well on the visual front, as long takes captured with a jittery handheld camera add to the gritty feel. The majority of apartments and buildings that we visit throughout the movie are sickly places complete with heavily stained ceilings. It's not attractive, but here it feels necessary to the story. By establishing the murky qualities of the narrative through the physical surroundings, Iñárritu is free to push beyond the obvious and into refreshing thematic territory. But he ends up staying in the exact same space for the entirety of the movie, interested only in wallowing in the pain.

Simmering in the juices of self-loathing and regret, Biutiful is an ambitiously conceived, though dramatically useless endeavour. It's a moody meditation on life and death that has nothing to say. Without a meaningfully emotional (or emotionally meaningful) trajectory, the story's exploration of human darkness ends up feeling far more repetitive than insightful. Bardem strongly leads a committed cast, but the performances can't save the movie from its one-note depiction of despair. There's nothing beautiful in this movie, which is exactly how Iñárritu likes it. And therein lies the problem.