I have a cat named Bo and he is very afraid of everything. That’s neither here nor there, except to say that I like the title Beau is Afraid. It resonates with me.

Look, I’m just going to say up front that very few people are going to think Ari Aster’s third film is his best. And at the moment, it definately is his most divisive. But that doesn’t mean it’s a not a good film. (I actually think its a great film.) It really depends on your tolerance of weird films. 

If you have seen Takashi Miike’s Gozu or Darren Aronofsky’s mother! you can probably appreciate what I’m saying. Is Gozu better than Audition? Is mother! better than Black Swan or Requiem for a Dream? Most would say “no”. Gozu and mother! are both films that have their mass appeal hindered by an additional level of abstraction and absurdity that the previous works don’t have. Not that Audition, Black Swan and Requiem for a Dream don’t have their surreal moments, but Gozu and mother! Have the feel of being completely unhinged visions by directors who are masters of psychological horror, reminding us that maybe great filmmakers work best when showing a little restraint. The same is true if we compare Beau is Afraid to Hereditary or Midsummar.

But, if you’re open to the experience, there is also a certain appeal in the spectacle. We are no longer voyeuristically observing subjects from the outside. These are movies that put us directly into the heads of our protagonists, showing us hallucinatory worlds occupied by the possibility of cowmen…the birthing of a middle-aged adult…cannibalistic newborn sacrifices…and penis monsters. It is still psychological horror, but now the horror floats inside a world of dreams making these films hard to compare to their more comprehensive conterparts.

And for anybody who likes to watch films high, these are the best trips outside of a Gasper Noé film. 

So yes, I do appreciate what Ari Aster was trying to accomplish with Beau is Afraid. It currently sits with an audience rating of 6.7 on IMDb, which is actually pretty good considering the type of film it is. And Aster himself seems confident the film will eventually hit cult status, and he might eventually be proven right, though I personally don’t feel that directors should intentionally promote their films in this way. Cult status should happen organically.  

But that three hour runtime is…exhausting…and it definitely turned a lot of people off. A24 films thrive on a certain word-of-mouth, but the word-of-mouth on Beau was Afraid was almost nonexistent despite the $35 million budget- the highest for the studio at the time. Hell, I didn’t even know the film existed until after it was already out of theaters. Clearly there was an expectation that the Aster name could sell itself and it didn’t. And honestly, I wonder if the response Beau is Afraid might have been more positive if it was released on a major streaming platform as a four-part series.

Hell, I even looked at that run-time and thought if I was going to get through this one I might need a in-two-installment plan. But I screwed up my own plan after starting the film again on the second day from the beginning even though I was already more than an hour in. But hey, the beginning of this film is really, really good and I wanted to see it again. So I guess in the end I did manage to get through it in one sitting. (It was a really late night.)

Beau is Afraid stars Joaquin Phoenix. Anyone familiar with Phoenix’s work is going to recognize aspects of his past characters in Beau. Beau is an anxiety-ridden recluse with a strong aversion to conflict. Over the years, playing a recluse with anxiety has been Phoenix’s bread and butter. And the world Aster creates around Beau is full of aggression and danger. It’s a hyperbolic, satirical view America that is crippling to a person with Beau’s inherent apprehension and jitteriness.

From a brief conversation between Beau and his psychiatrist we learn that Beau has mother issues. He denies it, but it’s clear that attending his mother’s upcoming birthday is contributing to his current level of stress.

But things take an unfortunate turn when Beau misses his flight for reasons that are not entirely his fault and then, after his home gets comically invaded for reasons that ARE entirely his fault, he calls his mother- only to learn that she has likely died because of a fallen chandelier.  

The rest of the film is about Beau’s quest to get to his mother’s funeral. Needless to say, things continue to not go well for poor Beau.

Beau is Afraid is epic in length and ambition. Aster tries to offer us something off-beat, but grandiose, similar to Lars von Trier with The House That Jack Built. The film has four major acts, each with uniquely weird characters and bizarre events. Aster has given each of the acts a unique feel, with the play in act three being the peak of the weirdness (Aster hired León and Cociña- the minds behind The Wolf House– to help with the animation sequences during the play.) That is, until the film’s final minutes and the film goes all Pink Floyd’s The Wall on us. (Actually, I’ve read the main influence on the end is Albert Brooke’s 1991 film Defending Your Life. But it was hard for me not to think of “The Trial” when watching.)

As Beau, Joaquin Phoenix is great. Beau should not be an easy character to like because he has created a life where he has given himself so little actual agency. He is in a state of constant reaction and you can’t help to feel that he, as a grown man, is ultimately to blame for this.Yet Phoenix is able to fill the character full of a relatable pathos.In a way, he is symbolic of all of times people have chosen the path of least resistance- and as often can happens when a person continuously avoids conflict, it keeps blowing up in his face.

Of course, Beau has some cause to be the way he is. Flashbacks suggest that Beau’s relationship with his mother is complex and may be at the heart of his neurosis. When he was young, she controlled every aspect of his life and this may be why he has grown so painfully passive as an adult. We even learn that Beau has become afraid of sex because of fears that an orgasim could trigger heart failure- which, he is told, is how his father, grandfather and great-grandfather all died. 

At its core, Beau is Afraid is like a subverted modern reinterpretation of a Greek tragedy. Aster creates a world filled with human monsters and a hero whose downfall is guided by hubris- but here the hero’s tragic flaw doesn’t guide his action, but instead leads to a constant string of inaction. The film is absurd in its logic, and yet Beau’s sad struggle also feels familiar and human. And, for one brief moment, maybe even a bit heroic. 

Regardless of what anyone says about Beau is Afraid, there is no denying that it is a unique and daring film experience. Commercially, Aster’s reputation has taken a hit with this film, but at least in my mind Beau is Afraid cemented my belief that Aster is one of the most important and provocative American filmmakers working today.