Copy pasting my original comment:

Bardo was actually an enjoyable movie that left me thinking a lot afterwards

When the previews dropped I was super excited about Bardo since I am such a huge fan of Alejandro González Iñárritu, but once reviews started to come out I was really scared to watch it. Sadly I didn’t have a chance to watch it on a theatre and watched it last night on Netflix and was pleasantly surprised…

I don’t think this is his best movie, if anything I would put it in the last spot. But under no circumstances I would say this is a bad movie. Although maybe until the first half ended I was extremely confused, I never found myself wanting to leave the movie unwatched, I was rather curious to figure out how it all tied together and I think what made me want to stay and enjoy that confusion was the fact that a lot of the movie is choreographed and therefore the rhythm never fell flat, plus many of the situations have an absurdity to them that made them even funny.

Surely this is Alejandro’s most abstract work so far and probably his most personal (as far as I’ve read), and when more abstract movies come along it’s easy to simply rate them as “bad”, but I feel like these movies need to be appreciated more as a mixture of pieces that come along to make us think; and granted, something abstract doesn’t mean it will accomplish the thinking, but in this case it did it to me. It’s been 24 hours since I finished it and I am still wrapping my head around so many [beautiful] shots and complicated discourses, and that to me is already a great sign. ​ Overall I truly enjoyed this movie and think the execution, even though super ambitious and at points confusing, was all well-thought. The topics it touches are also incredibly relevant especially for Mexicans (identity in terms of a place, people’s disappearances, success and ego, family, social classes, history…) and it does so in a way that is engaging and given the magic-realism elements it makes you truly think the deeper meaning of things, not only for the director and the characters, but also for yourself.