Consider me at “giddy nerd” levels of excitement after the international trailer for writer-director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman. Michael Keaton’s down-on-his-luck actor is slowly losing his mind and it looks super intriguing.

Keaton plays former Birdman actor Riggan Thomson who gave up the role after three movies and apparently has struggled to regain legitimacy since. Imagine Adam West in full-on meltdown mode, and you get the picture. The film sees Thomson attempting to resurrect his career with a Broadway play, but anxiety, disaster, and a little bit of psychosis seems to put the whole project in peril.

A quick note: some fans might see some parallels between Keaton’s post-Batman career and Thomson, but the actor was working steadily before and after that film. What’s cool is that he was such an odd choice for the character, that when he didn’t sign up for another film after Batman Returns, he was able to go back to being a funny and intense weirdo like God made him.

It’s the latest for Babel and Amores Perros filmmaker Iñárritu, who’s teamed up this time with his Biutiful writer Nicolás Giacobone for the screenplay.

Even with the little bit on display, it looks like Iñárritu wasn’t shy about tackling CG in the film (his previous work has been largely practical, intimate dramas where giant hallucinatory birds and raining fireballs might have been a little out of place). Frankly, it looks like the director is messing around in Charlie Kaufman territory with something that looks as odd as the back half of Being John Malkovich.

Michael Keaton, Zach Galifianakis, Edward Norton, and Emma Stone star in Birdman, which will be in theaters October 17 from Fox Searchlight.

[via Entertainment Weekly]