Bo Burnham: Inside (2021)

4 Stars (out of 4)

Funny Story

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

There will no doubt be many things written, recorded, and filmed about the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, but Bo Burnham: Inside will be among the most penetrating. The former stand-up comic turned director (Eighth Grade) and actor (Promising Young Woman) was about to take to the stage again when the pandemic hit, so he made this collection of funny, dark songs and sketches and clever lighting FX entirely in his home, entirely by himself. There are laughs here, but Inside is largely a dispiriting dive into a suffering psyche, as potent as Pink Floyd The Wall. It's impossible to tell where Burnham's creative whirlwind begins and his descent into anxiety-ridden madness ends, but it feels like a true, unfettered unburdening of the soul.