OTT: Joaquin Phoenix's 'Beau Is Afraid' is now streaming
Is your Amazon Prime Video subscription in place? One of 2023's most widely discussed—and polarizing films—Beau is Afraid arrived on the streamer on Sunday. Headlined by Joaquin Phoenix and directed by Midsommar and The Strange Thing About the Johnsons fame Ari Aster, the film was released in the United States in April 2023. It recently won Phoenix a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy.
Plot and cast of 'Beau Is Afraid'
IMDb describes the plot of the nearly three-hour-long film as, "Following the sudden death of his mother, a mild-mannered but anxiety-ridden man confronts his darkest fears as he embarks on an epic, Kafkaesque odyssey back home." It is Aster's third feature film. Apart from Phoenix, Beau Is Afraid stars Patti LuPone, Amy Ryan, Nathan Lane, Kylie Rogers, Bill Hader, and Denis Menochet, among others.
Glance at diverse reviews it received
Beau is Afraid met with astonishingly starkly different reviews, with some critics calling it akin to torture while others terming it one of Phoenix's best performances. While Variety said that Phoenix played a "simpering man-child," Haaretz wrote, "The insufferable Beau Is Afraid shows what's wrong with Hollywood." The Guardian, on the other hand, said, "It clearly addresses the writer-director's (Aster) parental anxieties, allowing him to vent and visualize a series of dreams-turned-nightmares related to guilt, repression and inherited trauma."
