You've gotta read in between the lines with this one

This isn't a movie for people who watch films only to be entertained, and anyone going into it with that expectation is going to hate it, and I don't blame them.

I'm taking this largely from a previous post I made, but look at it like this: this film is a power play up until the final moments where the tables turn and Lucy takes emotional control over a situation. It's allegorical. Everything else prior to the final scene is completely filler to her, and is, therefore, completely filler to us as an audience. In all reality, she is a protagonist devoid of character. She is a shell. That's why people don't like this movie; we can't really connect with her, but we aren't supposed to. Whether or not her nonchalant existence is a commentary on modern culture or not is up in the air, but the fact remains that, in the walls of this movie, she doesn't care about anything or anybody, really.

Let's look at it: in the film, we gather that Lucy's relationship with her mother is strained and means little to her. She doesn't have any sort of friendship with her roommates and seems to hardly acknowledge them, nor does she have any friends or acquaintances aside from Birdman. She disrespects her body by prostituting herself and experimenting with drugs. She risks her own health by selling her body to medical corporations as a lab rat for quick cash. She also works as an office temp. and at a restaurant, but doesn't seem to have any sense or regard for her jobs. And all of this for what? She attends college but doesn't seem to really know why she's there or care about what she's there for. Her jobs mean little more to her than a means to pay her rent and restlessly push herself through college which, as aforementioned, doesn't seem to hold any value to her. What is she even doing there? She goes through the motions like a hamster in its wheel but doesn't seem to know or care why; it's as if she's not awake to the world because she is so distracted by the demands of society that she doesn't see the circularity of her actions or the risks she's taking as being a threat to her, nor does she even know why she's taking those risks in the first place. She's totally opaque as a person. She's absent; a caricature, really, to the point that she seems alien to us.

It's not until the very last scene that she has a moment in her life that pushes her out of her cultural coma and into the actual present; the here and then. It's almost as if the film is nudging and prodding the audience with the question: "Are you awake?" and if not, "What does it take?". How long can you be a "sleeping beauty"? Some people are "sleeping beauties" until the day the die; some people sleep through life. Others wake up. Sleep, while necessary to life, cannot dominate life physically, mentally, and emotionally. That is the point of this film as I saw it. Lucy is an example of someone pushed to extremes in order to wake up from her trance toward the universe.

Unfortunately, the people who NEED to hear the statement this movie makes are the ones who are most likely to never hear it, and if they do, they are probably in too deep a sleep to fully comprehend it. The movie comes off like a wake-up call to critical thinking, but if that was Julia Leigh's intent, she's not going to get very far with it because people who don't think critically aren't going to be affected by it in the first place. It's just going to come off as confusing and pointless because people with underdeveloped critical thinking skills don't have the tools to dissect a piece of work like this. It's almost asinine that it was even made in that sense, but I still think it's a movie of value, if not for its metaphors, at least for its performances and unusual and creepy atmosphere. I've never seen anything like it. Everyone involved in this movie took a massive risk in even making it, and, judging from these boards and the critical reviews out there on it, most people either missed or DISMISSED what was being said in between the lines and used it to attack the movie rather than acknowledge what was being implied.

In a sense, the fact that this movie even exists seems as pointless as the life that Lucy inhabits as a character. It's almost as if it were a cinematic oxymoron and never should have even been filmed. Maybe THAT was the whole point and Julia Leigh is just playing tricks on us for laughs, but I somehow doubt it. Regardless, you have to read between the lines here or this movie is totally useless, and I'm willing to admit that— and this is coming from someone who actually LIKED it. There's nothing really truly being said by this film, and yet, by the nature of its existence, there's a lot being said. That's why people can't stand it, because it's like one big whopping oxymoron, and oxymorons are frustrating. So, Ms. Leigh, congratulations on frustrating 95% of moviegoers. I appreciate the endeavor and artistry of the film, but I think her message is lost in translation, at least for now. Time will tell.