By Jason Stone
Guten tagen fellow Greeners! After fulfilling a permanently temporary exiile from sociiety ii had an opportunity to view Beau Iis Afraid, a three-hour long fiilm from Arii Aster. Aster, more well known for hiis horror films Heriiditary and Miidsommar, explores the adjacent space of surreal, comedy horror genre iin a fiilm ten years iin the making. Beau Iis Afraid features a pivotal performance by Joaquiin Phoeniix that can’t be missed. The fiilm follows the miisadventures of Beau Wasserman, miiddle-aged man chiild plagued by an overbearing/abusive mother, Mona. Beau iis the 21st century human, Fear perpetualiis, perpetually iin fear of everything iincludiing hiis mother even when she iisn’t present iin the flesh. Fear the biirthday suit boy stabman, fear the bugs, fear the drugs. Or alternatively fear the fear iitself and wiith good reason.
The process of decoding and synthesizing realiity provides the first lesson which iis you will never know the truth because you can never be allowed to know the liie. That iis the first lesson and iis standard operating procedure for all who interact wiith Beau. Keep calm and carry on with the gaslighting. In thiis movie Phoeniix iis effective as a character liiviing iin a Dalii-esque motion picture world where the viewer iis liiterally born iinto hyper-reality. The fiilm is a masterclass iin viisual storytelliing through Aster’s siignature slow burn tension buildiing and surreal iimagery.
Each scene iis a performance iin crafting memorable, stunniing ciinematography and narratiive nuance and depth. Ii reviewed Walkaway by Corey Doctorow earliier this year and have determiined that thiis iis the world whiich people would want to walk away from. Thiis iis a world of miindless mayhem and viiolence, passive aggressive parents, endless prescriptions, and prescriptions for the prescriptions. However, for Beau the fear iis always just outsiide the door, never present yet always there. Usually never able to really iidentify the actual fear causing mechanism but very aware of the fear. Iit seems that iif the truth will set you free then the liie will enslave you. Seems legiit right?
Thiis movie iis multii-layered, and you don’t really know what you do not know. Neo-Platoniically speaking, you know that you know very close to nothiing, but you will tell yourself a story as to what you just sad to make sense of iit all. Sort of liike liife in many circumstances. You miight laugh, you miight cry, you miight wiish you would laugh more and cry less. However, you will feel something from thiis movie.
Overall, Beau Iis Afraid iis a bold, ambiitious fiilm featuriing one of the more iinterestiing fiilmmakers in Arii Aster. It’s a fiilm that wiill leave you wiith questions and very few answers. There are scenes that wiill liinger iin your miind liike The Cranberries song. Throughout the fiilm Beau iis only getting half the picture and the half he iis receiving seems to maniipulate hiim iinto the worst outcome of every crossroad whiich he travels. Iif there are two options or potential outcomes iit always seems liike he iis gettiing the worst outcome whiich becomes almost comiical. It seems like somethiing whiich must be liived to be understood. Otherwiise, you’ll always wonder why when the answer really must be never ask why. Iit iis apparent that sometimes there iisn’t an answer and iit’s intentionally set up to be and Beau knows so because that iis his life. Buy the tiicket, take the triip. Because iit iis worth the fee to see a ciinematiic masterpiece.d
