Beau Is Afraid is the best film of 2023
Sometimes, a film comes out at the exact right time to invoke a primal reaction in certain people. I did not see Beau Is Afraid when it was in theaters. It is not like I am against seeing longer films on the big screen. I have sat through multiple 12-hour horrorthons without issue. Perhaps it just got lost in the shuffle upon release. That and I was dealing with having Covid at the time, so my priorities were elsewhere. I do not envy anybody attempting to market this film to a mass audience. It was A24’s biggest budget release to date, and it was far from a success. Props to them for sticking by Ari Aster, however, since they are putting out his next film.
Aster is a filmmaker I have a lot of respect for. He clearly has extensive film knowledge and knows how to channel it in his work. Beau is the first time his influences come together to create something unique to him. His first film Hereditary has fantastic performances and powerful human drama, but most of the horror scenes didn’t click for me. With the obvious exception of one genuinely shocking moment that anybody who has seen the film will remember. Aster showed a striking proficiency in his debut that is rare to see. Hereditary is an admirable effort, yet it is one that feels like a compilation of horror tropes from more engaging films of other directors rather than a film with its own identity. Despite my issues with it, I instinctually knew that Aster was going to soon create a film I loved.
His follow-up Midsommer certainly has echoes of other films about Pagan cults, such as the wonderful 70s classic The Wicker Man. I felt he was able to create a more distinct film thanks to its focus on Florence Pugh’s character, Dani, and her emotional journey. Aster was beginning to establish a compelling voice with an emphasis on grounding brutality and a bleak tone with spellbinding human traumas. Midsommer was a substantial step up from Hereditary and showed he was close to creating something truly special. A film that could not be made by anyone else.
I am not surprised that Beau is Afraid was a financial disappointment for A24. I cannot imagine how anybody could market a film like this. The trailer does an admirable job of summing up the tone, but it only hints at the bizarre proceedings. On the surface the plot is relatively simple: A man suffering from crippling anxiety and agoraphobia goes on a journey to see his mother. That could play out it in countless different ways. Some filmmakers would lean more on the wacky comedy angle and create an off-the-wall farcical escapade; possibly starring Will Ferrell. I would actually love to see Ferrell tackle material like this; it would be unlike anything else he’s done.
There are ways to market a surreal film to a wide audience; look at the following Charlie Kaufman has amassed. His films are not Marvel-level blockbusters, but they have a large following. Beau is Afraid is more akin to Synecdoche New York than Adaptation. While I think Adaptation is a wonderful film, Synecdoche is one of my all-time favorites. It also happens to be one of Kaufman’s most divisive and critically mixed films. Those who love Synecdoche have a profound connection with the material. I can see Beau attracting a similar following.
Beau is Ari Aster’s Synecdoche New York. It’s a deeply personal and resonant film that feels like it comes from the heart. It came out while many people were far-removed from the isolating impacts of Covid, though the film’s development predates Hereditary by quite a few years. It started life as a short film he made in 2011 called Beau. Later, in 2014, an early feature length draft circulated online. Most people first became familiar with Aster via Hereditary, but he had been making excellent short films for a few years before that. One in particular called The Strange Thing About the Johnsons is one of the most impressive shorts I can remember. It contains all the hallmarks of what would become Aster’s signature twisted style.
During Covid, there were some films that tried to tap into the paranoia and anxieties many of us felt. With a few remarkable exceptions such as Bo Burnham’s fantastic film, Inside, most attempts at relating to our universal existential angst came across as out of touch. Beau is not directly about the pandemic, but the disquiet it conjures sparked that same unease I felt when I was stuck in my apartment, not knowing what was going on. I distinctly recall worrying that if my neighbors got Covid then the molecules from their sneezing would travel into my apartment via the air conditioning. Reaching that level of paranoia was a sure sign that all was not well. Watching Beau was an oddly therapeutic reminder of those strange times.
The film opens with Beau (Joaquin Phoenix) having a session with his unnamed therapist (Stephen McKinley Henderson). I was not made aware of the tremendous Stephen McKinley Henderson until the recent brilliant TV show Devs. I wish I had known about his talents sooner. He has one of the best voices around. He only has a couple of scenes in Beau, but it is a testament to his excellence that I remember every detail of those moments. Here, I knew immediately that Beau is a troubled soul. He is uncomfortable talking to people and has a profound fear of his domineering mother, Mona (Patti LuPone).
Joaquin Phoenix is absolutely brilliant as Beau. It is strange that he gave us my favorite performance of the year here and my least favorite in Napoleon. The colossal neurosis he is plagued by is etched into Phoenix’s face. Even when he is not speaking, we see the gale-force storm roaring inside his brain. I cannot imagine any other actor today playing the role as well as him. He never winks at the camera and plays up the bizarre situations for a laugh. The accelerating anguish he deals with is rooted in pain and never made fun of, even though the film itself can be hilarious in the most warped way imaginable.
Beau lives in a grungy apartment building in what appears to be a constant battlefield. Drug addicts, loonies, and homeless people roam in a state of perpetual chaos and violence. It looks like a post-apocalyptic sci-fi film at times, given how decimated the landscape is. Gun-toting gang members are just as everyday to him as the street signs. There is one naked knife-wielding wacko who is one of the few who goes out of his way to threaten Beau. Most of the others ignore him and go about their day. These early scenes of madness are among the best in the film, where I felt like I was there with Phoenix, tuning out the terrifying world.
While I never visualized that degree of derangement when I ventured outside during the worst days of Covid, I was still able to empathize with Beau’s fears. For a long time during the extended indoor period of the pandemic, I saw the surrounding as a hostile environment. Not just because of the possibility of sickness, there was a lamentable distrust of people I developed in part because of a phone app called Citizen. This app is designed to inform people about possible crimes in the area. Since the reports are mostly user-submitted, the fact-checking is dubious, to say the least. I would estimate that at least half of the reports are bullshit and rarely followed up on.
Like Beau, because of the small world I was living in, I was more susceptible to believing the app’s reports. I wish that weren’t the case since Citizen presents a distorted and unrealistic version of reality. If you believed everything you saw there you would think your surroundings were a never-ending inferno of crime and societal degradation. Much like how Beau views his surroundings. Even though I am far removed from that mentality today, I still sometimes get that pang of unease when I hear about a possible heinous act committed in my city. When I saw Phoenix rushing to get inside after witnessing his neighborhood falling apart it reminded me of how corrupt my perception of the world became.
Much of the film’s events are ambiguous as to whether they happened in real life or just in his head. It is difficult to imagine anybody taking the entire film literally considering how outlandish the events are. I believe that the majority of Beau’s plight is a manifestation of the imagined terrors in his tumultuous mind. Beau’s journey to visit his mother is immediately blind-sided when he misses the flight. The guilt trip she takes him on foreshadows his eventual journey to be by her side. He has been psychologically controlled by his mother for his entire life. She mentally manipulated him into steering clear of any sexual relationship by lying to him about the death of his father. According to her, Beau’s father died during sex with her because of a heart problem. She makes her son believe that he inherited the same heart condition that could be triggered by an orgasm.
This fear of experiencing anything outside his comfort zone is at the core of Beau’s turbulent psyche. He can never be free of this sheltered mindset thanks to the way his mother has kept him trapped in his head. This is one of the few films that has captured the way it feels to deal with astronomical levels of anxiety. The kind that contorts the way you see reality and makes you feel like a mouse stuck in a bathtub, scampering up the sides and always falling back down to the plughole.
This mental torture has kept Beau locked away in his unkempt apartment, afraid that the rest of the world is a volatile warzone. His quest to visit his mom takes a dark turn when she suddenly dies before he can reach her. The phone call he receives from a delivery guy perfectly encapsulates the morbid comedy in the film. There is a macabre absurdity to the conversation at first, but this soon makes way for tragedy when he finds out from the delivery person what happened to his mother. We never see the circumstances of her demise, yet the image lingered in my mind due to how gruesome the idea of it was. The family pressures him to attend the funeral because she cannot be properly buried until he is there. Even in death she still finds a way to torment Beau and control his every move.
It would spoil the joy of the film to detail every step of his quest, so I will not delve into too many specifics. Part of what makes this film so magnificent is the high-wire tonal balance it perfects. It pinballs back and forth between Beau’s hellish downward spiral and the ridiculous circumstances he stumbles into. Before Beau can set off on his new quest to bury his mother, he is hit by a truck. He wakes up in the home of Grace (Amy Ryan) and Roger (Nathan Lane). They brought him home after the accident and are taking care of him. Their friendliness is disarming and seemingly sincere. That is the trick the film pulls on the audience; you are never entirely certain what the motivations of the characters around Beau are. Can they be trusted or are they a sinister cog in the grand machine of his escalating guilt over not seeing his mother before she died? Could she be pulling the strings from beyond the grave?
Beau is Afraid does not stay in one place too long. It is a nonstop mental upheaval, putting you in the head of a man who never feels safe. A consistent critique I have seen of the film is how the pace slackens too much in the middle. This is where Beau has an extended stay in a community of woodsy theater folk putting on a play. I totally understand why some find this to be the weakest point of the film. It is a complete pacing change compared to the manic nature of the earlier scenes. For me, these moments of respite in the woods are essential to Beau’s growth. The play they put on is a direct reflection of the romanticized life he craves, the storybook fantasy that he feels his mom deprived him of. The film would not have worked so well without a portion of the running time dedicated to letting us breathe. We need to see what Beau is yearning for before it is cruelly ripped away.
I could write multiple essays analyzing the intricacies of Beau is Afraid. There are numerous aspects of the film I did not talk about. It is a divisive film, to say the least. To be honest, I get why. There was no way this would appeal to a mass audience. The close to 3-hour runtime doesn’t help. I have seen Ari Aster describe the film in multiple, increasingly delightful ways, first, as a “nightmare comedy.” That is probably the most accurate and succinct description. He later said the film is "a Jewish Lord of the Rings, but [Beau's] just going to his mom's house." That is a tad vaguer, yet it is oddly fitting. Easily the best way Aster has described the film is "if you pumped a 10-year-old full of Zoloft, and [had] him get your groceries." I cannot think of a better way to sum up the film.
