Ryan Lynch - Existentialism in Birdman

The film Birdman was a massive indie success in 2014, winning the Oscar for best picture.  The movie centers around a past his prime actor (Riggan) looking for a career reviving turn on Broadway.  An attempt to make people respect him as an actor.  The film is shot to make it look like it was made in entirely one shot with no cuts.  This incredible technical achievement makes it so Riggan is quite literally the focus of every shot visually and narratively as he is at the center of what is happening in the film.  This exemplifies Riggan's search for meaning and his inability to find his place in the world.  Riggan hos lost his way in life, once a massive movie star with everything going right for him, he has now been cast aside by the ruthless Hollywood machine.  Throughout the film he hears this inner voice speaking to him asking him explicitly existential questions such as how did I get here? Where am I? and Who am I?  Eventually this voice manifests itself into his old superhero character "Birdman" and speaks to him in this form.

         His yearning for approval from the masses of audiences leaves him feeling empty inside.  His search for relevance based on society's standards makes him even more alone than he was before.  When we seek meaning in the crowd, we lose, we must seek meaning from within ourselves.  In the end of the film we see Riggan standing on a window ledge, were not sure if he is committing suicide or not, but when his daughter enters he is gone, and she looks up into the sky for Riggan.  It is an open-ended movie leaving us to interpret whether he finally found meaning to his life, or plummeted to his death in hopeless despair.  The movie's subtitle is "The unexpected virtue of ignorance"  it fits well with Kierkegaard's views as he states that absurdity and ignorance are attributes.  Riggan is only able to realize his selfhood and own importance through ignorance of the mass opinions.