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Source article.

Extract:

Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman is so good, so profoundly entertaining, so confident that it makes you wonder whether the other Iñárritu — the director of such weighty magazine spreads as 21 Grams, Babel, and Biutiful — was a fraud all along.

I don't understand what the author wants to imply with "weighty magazine spreads".

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  • In Merriam-Webster: spread: 2. something spread out: as c(1) : a prominent display in a periodical (2): two facing pages (as of a newspaper) usually with matter running across the fold; also : the matter occupying these pages
    – choster
    Commented Oct 23, 2014 at 21:30

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Weighty magazine spread refers to important supplementary pages in the magazines.

  • Two facing pages of a magazine or newspaper, often with related matter extending across the fold.

(from TFD)

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  • But why does it have to be supplements?
    – Kris
    Commented Oct 23, 2014 at 20:50
  • Does not have to, but it gives the idea of something given in addition to the ordinary magazine.,
    – user66974
    Commented Oct 23, 2014 at 21:01
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I understand the writer to be referring to bold and provocative films by metaphorically associating them with magazine spreads (also known in publishing as "double-page spreads"), which represent the grandest opportunity that print editors and art directors have to present their visions. This is confirmed later in the article by the author's suggestion that Iñárritu has a "big, loud, deeply seductive" and "self-important" style.

That said, I think the metaphor is weak -- consistent with the rest of the piece, which I find overwrought. I'm not surprised you found the metaphor confusing.

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