Review: 'Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths' Pompous, Exhausting

After winning two Oscars for Best Director in 2015 and 2016 (a feat only achieved by two other filmmakers), Alejandro González Iñárritu returns with a trip back to his home country of Mexico in "Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths." That title alone should act as a sign that Iñárritu, the man responsible for works like "Babel," "Birdman," and "The Revenant," hasn't changed his preference for pretension and positing himself as a capital-A Artist, one who tackles big ideas with all the wonder and awe that cinema can evoke. And now, with his latest feature, he's finally decided to go personal and make a movie about himself.

To be fair, almost every Iñárritu movie is about him to some degree, given his approach of making viewers constantly aware of his presence behind the camera through elaborate long takes or meticulous compositions with no breathing room. "Bardo" follows Silverio (Daniel Gimenez Cacho), a journalist and documentary filmmaker who left Mexico over two decades ago and is now a legendary figure in his field about to receive a prestigious award in America. At the same time, he's about to receive a different award in Mexico, so he takes his family from Los Angeles to Mexico City where he finds his life drifting between reality, fantasy, and memory.

For a short while, "Bardo" gets by on its pomposity, if only because of its scale and craftsmanship. An early sequence finds Silverio at a TV studio about to appear on a talk show hosted by a former colleague, which unfolds in a single take that has the camera roaming through several studios, backstage, and finally on the broadcast itself, which turns out to be a literal nightmare (we find out after the fact that Silverio dreamt the entire scenario and never showed up for his appearance). Cinematographer Darius Khondji and production designer Eugenio Caballero use wide angle lenses, bold colors, and large scale sets to pull off an impressive scene, with surreal elements gradually taking over the shot until there's no way to discern between objective and subjective points of view. It's "Bardo's" high point, which doesn't count for much since there's still about two more hours to go once it ends.

As dazzling as "Bardo" may be at its highest points, Iñárritu's bad instincts wipe out any chance of the film salvaging itself. A later scene, where Silverio attends an award ceremony and afterparty, has the TV host show up and launch into Silverio, calling him pretentious and even refers to scenes that have already happened (all part of Silverio's movie within this movie, apparently). Silverio snaps back at him, insulting journalists for depending on clickbait articles and manipulating the truth, before he waves his hand and removes the host's ability to speak altogether. In other words, we're seeing Iñárritu's alter-ego argue with a mouthpiece for his critics over the merits of "Bardo" and his talents as a director, which he rigs to win since it's his film and he's the one in control. If you think that's exhausting to read, try watching it.

That's more or less what "Bardo" amounts to: Iñárritu building a surrealist self-conscious monument to himself, with the hope that self-awareness will somehow exonerate himself from his own hubris. Watch Silverio argue with Hernán Cortés on a tower of corpses of Aztecs, wonder if the film is really doing this, then see the bodies get up to reveal they're all extras on the set of Silverio's movie, which I guess is some attempt to poke fun at the terrible idea Iñárritu nonetheless still follows through on. Want something more personal? There's also the tragic death of Silverio's son shortly after being born, which gets represented by the baby being shoved back into his mother because he doesn't want to live in such a messed up world. These are the kinds of choices Iñárritu makes and viewers have to put up with, and after enduring them for over two-and-a-half hours I had to wonder: Did I just take a journey through Iñárritu's mind, or did I subject myself to his colonoscopy? I guess the distinction doesn't make a difference, since "Bardo" shows a filmmaker so high on his own supply that everything he spews is a gift to everyone, no matter what side of him it comes out of.

"Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths" is in theaters Nov. 18 with a streaming release on Netflix scheduled for Dec. 16.