Film Reviews

Biutiful

• Rating:
• Director: Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu
• Starring: Javier Bardem
• Details: Spain/Mexico / 148mins (15A).

After scooping Best Director at Cannes for Babel four years ago, Inarritu returns with a simpler affair than his world-encompassing drama. Centred on one character in one city (a Barcelona of seedy back-streets and sweatshops), Inarritu can't help but branch out from its storyline by giving each subplot as much time and attention as its main one. The result may be a little unfocussed but it's always an engrossing one.
Uxbal (Bardem) has always lived on the edge of things. Separated from his bipolar wife (Alvarez) and bringing up his two children (Bouchaib and Estralla) on his own, Uxbal is detached from what it means to be a husband and a father. On the border of law and order, he flits between drug dealers and corrupt police. Able to communicate with the dead, Uxbal finds himself on the periphery of life itself when he is diagnosed with cancer and sets about seeking redemption in the short time he has left.
There are no easy answers in Biutiful other than to have faith in humanity. But when we all make mistakes – some small, like berating your child for putting too much food in his mouth; some big, like failing to posses the necessary understanding to love someone with a bipolar disorder; and some gargantuan, like feeling responsible for the deaths of many – it's hard to do so. And there is no answer to why Innaritu felt compelled to include so much in Biutiful.
Because it can all be a tad messy. Inarritu devotes as much time to Biutiful's main story of Uxbal's redemption as he does to the thematic subplots and nothing is fully seen all the way through. The 'Javier Bardem Sees Dead People' story isn't fully realised and pops up so sporadically over the sprawling two-and-a-half-hours, it's as if the director forgot all about it and then decided to throw in a scene at the last minute.
Bardem's Uxbal is asked to be one person one minute, then asked to do and feel something completely out of character. In the hands of a lesser director, this wouldn't click but Innaritu somehow makes every facet a believable side to one complex character. His scenes with his family work best and if Innaritu had concentrated on this alone, we'd be watching a better film. Bardem, in almost every scene, shoulders a lot of the responsibility and delivers his greatest performance to date. He's not alone with Alvarez pitching in with an astounding turn as his troubled wife.

Review by Gavin Burke