Abstract
This article examines the figure of the father as the thematic and narrative thread in Alejandro González Iñárritu's Biutiful (2010). Paternity is essential to the movie's transnational perspective and its exploration of the effects of globalization: the film is organized around father figures, and the protagonist Uxbal (Javier Bardem) is connected to fathers from other countries as he transcends cultural and national borders. Absent fathers bring together the stories of several families that live precariously in Barcelona. In this article, I argue that although Biutiful denounces the vulnerable situation of immigrants in contemporary neoliberal society, the notion of paternity that it presents is traditional. A series of fathers from different parts of the world (Spain, Mexico, China and Senegal) are portrayed as the protective figures of their families and as the ones responsible for keeping their families together. The movie privileges the father in relation to memory and legacy, and it presents fathers in relation to their responsibilities, their authority and the law. In so doing, the film encompasses Western (Hispanic) and non-Western (Chinese) traditions of fatherhood and patriarchy.
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