Critically acclaimed filmmaker Alejandro Gonzalez Iñarritu released his 7th feature film this month, Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths, a film which explores the psyche of an esteemed Mexican journalist traveling back to his home town in Mexico weeks before receiving an award for his recent documentary. Last night I had the pleasure of attending a screening of this film at the Norris Cinema Theater on USC’s campus, followed up by an interview with Iñarritu himself.
Bardo seemingly works as a Mosaic of different ideas, memories and emotions that abandon narrative in favor of a more raw, candid, and, at times, outrageous exploration of what it means to be in a state of “in between”. Iñarritu explores the idea of Bardo, or a state limbo between two things, through his main character, Silverio Gama. Gama is a constantly fluctuating image of a man, whose personhood is rooted less in the concrete, framed vision of most cinematic characters, but rather rooted in a more fluid, dynamic fashion which fixes Gama from the beginning as someone who is caught between multiple identities and mindscapes.
The narrative is told through the lens of Gama’s memories as he sits in a coma after a stroke. Halfway between life and death. His memories recount returning to Mexico after 20 years of working in the US. Not quite American enough to be an American, but still too far removed from his Mexican roots to pick up where he left off in his home country. And finally, as an artist and journalist, his attitude toward his work is stuck in an eternal struggle between fame and shame as his documentary work is placed under constant criticism. On the topic of Gama’s swirling identities, Time Magazine critic Stephanie Zacharek writes, “Silverio was born in Mexico but has lived mostly in Los Angeles, a place he calls home. But is it really home? This is one of the big questions that swirls through the movie like a bird of prey. Silverio has become successful in a larger pond than the one he left back in Mexico” (Zacharek).
While Iñarritu takes a surrealist approach to this emotional and personal limbo, one could argue that this state of being “in between” is at the core of our personhood. As human beings and members of a society where nothing is ever quite as concrete as we’d like it to be, we’re constantly faced with the uncomfortable realization that we’re neither where we once were, nor where we want to be. This is the state of bardo that Iñarritu builds his feature film around, urging audiences to contemplate their own eternal states of limbo.
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