babel Photo

Babel

Starring: Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Gael Garcia Bernal, Koji Yakusho, Mahima Chaudhry

Directed by: Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu

RS: 4of 4 Stars Average User Rating: 3of 4 Stars

2006 Paramount Classics Drama

The Bible says God was angry when man tried to reach heaven by building a tower (later named Babel); he stopped the work by devising different languages that made understanding impossible. Babel came to mean noise and miscommunication.

Some things never change. The gifted Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and his remarkable screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga - this film completes the brilliant trilogy they began with Amores Perros and 21 Grams - have applied the concept of Babel to the way we live now, in a world threatened by terrorism and divided by language, race, money and religion. Heavy going? Not if you want to see something extraordinary. In the year's richest, most complex and ultimately most heartbreaking film, Inarritu invites us to get past the babble of modern civilization and start listening to each other.

His film throws us into the lives of broken families from Morocco to Tokyo, from posh San Diego to the poverty across the Mexican border. The jangle of dialects assaults our ears. Sign language is introduced. Time frames are splintered to add to the disorientation. But pay attention and these parallel lines do meet.

The actors work wonders in guiding us through the maze. Brad Pitt's Richard and Cate Blanchett's Susan are a San Diego couple on a healing trip to Morocco after their baby's death. Their two older kids are home with the maid, Amelia (Adriana Barraza), who defies Richard and the law by letting her firebrand nephew (Gael Garc’a Bernal) drive her and the kids into Mexico for a wedding.

The pivotal event occurs when Susan, on a tour bus with Richard, is shot in the shoulder. The bullet comes from a hunting rifle that a goat herder gave to his sons, one of whom fires wildly at the bus from a hillside. But with Susan bleeding and near death in a remote village and Richard phoning his rage to the U.S. embassy, the shooting is media-hyped into a terrorist incident. The impact stretches to Tokyo, where a father (Koji Yakusho) coping with the suicide of his wife and the promiscuity of his deaf-mute daughter, Chieko (Rinko Kikuchi), finds himself connected to the gun that shot Susan.

There is no way for a review to encompass the beautifully integrated, soul-searching portrait that Inarritu paints of a world in crisis. Pitt, raw and emotionally bruised, gives his most mature and moving performance to date. Cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto brings a poet's eye to the images. Stranded at the Mexican border, a victim of Bush immigration policy, Barraza leaves you shattered. At an ear-busting Tokyo disco, the sound goes dead so we hear only what Chieko hears. Kikuchi is unforgettable, nailing every nuance in her role. Just try to erase the sight of her, standing naked and vulnerable on a high-rise balcony while an uncaring city bustles below. All of Babel is like this – it's impossible to shake.

PETER TRAVERS

(Posted: Oct 20, 2006)

Your Turn

Give us your review of
Babel

Review 1 of 18

4of 4 Stars

“Babel” epitomizes; it is a realistic, moving and reflexive motion picture of Global communication and the inner depth of human beings. The film shows us four heartbreaking stories. While the cultures are well examined and we can appreciate the diversity of each one, we also follow the tragic downfall of the characters, desperate humans looking for a light in the end of the tunnel and the unexpected conflicts that they have to face.

“Babel” is full of symbolisms. We are all barely connected and that is what the connections of the film represent. Every story represents a situation that the world is widely living. The story of Susan getting accidentally shot by two Moroccan boys represents the war of Iraq (and the ending perfectly shows the downfall of this country). The death Japanese teenager represents teenagers in general, naïve persons who want to be understood.

“Babel” is directed by Alejandro Gonzales Iñarritu. He crafts an intense, moving and frightening atmosphere that is able to capture the viewer into the emotional context of the film. The cinematography from Rodrigo Prieto captures the diversity of every culture true fantastic yet fascinating shots. The performances of the film are incredible. Brad Pitt as Richard, Adriana Barraza as Amelia and Rinko Kikuchi as Chieko are the standouts.

“Babel” is nothing more than a film about the sensibility and errors of humanity. It is a deep representation of the world that we live in today and, a reflexive vision from visionary director and a film full of freedom of expression.

Aug 19, 2007 10:10:53

Review 2 of 18

2of 4 Stars

Boring. This movie was supposed to show the conflicts and problems between different cultures, and it did, but it could have done it a lot better. The characters didn't really captivate you so you couldn't really feel bad when a tragedy took place. The acting was pretty good. The story just didn't deliver the message that the movie was meant to show that well. It never gets you very interested. Acting, only strong point in this movie, and the ending shot of camera pulling away from apartment complex.

May 4, 2007 06:44:25

Review 3 of 18

4of 4 Stars

Wow. I think this one deserves a spot on my top 10 of the
year... I hold The Departed as my fave, but this one is up
there. If only this one could've been made last year and Crash
this year, so Babel and The Departed could've taken home top
honors... oh well. No story really overshadowed another story.
I liked every single one. My favorite, and I don't think I'm
alone here, was the nanny story. I also liked the Richard/
Susan story, and the Japan one was fine, although it was the
least connected so it seemed to weigh down the story a bit.
My least favorite, but not by too much, was the two boys
story. But they were all good. I liked the direction in this quite
a bit. It was very hands-on. The writing was fantastic, and the
preformances were stellar. My faves were the two Oscar
nominees, as well as Brad Pitt, who I still like better in Fight
Club (of course) but is incredible here, and everyone else was
fine. But Koji Yakusho and Gael García Bernal in headlining
roles? Sure, they're bigger stars, but... sheesh! Where's Rinko
Kikuchi and Adriana Barraza? Look at me, critisizing a
poster...The only thing wrong with it really was how often
they switched storylines. If they had just.... well, I guess it's
unavoidable. and they sure could've screwed it up much more,
so kudos to them. And the SCORE. I am so glad that score
won an Oscar, it was really, really good. The editing was also
a highlight.In my perfect world, Babel would've won at least
one more Oscar than it did, preferrably for Best Supporting
Actress. Then again, in my perfect world, The Fountain
would've gotten tons of noms, too... in fact, I already said that
in my perfect world, Babel and Crash would've switched
years... whatever. Babel is more like a wild, depressing,
moving experience than a movie. It's a thinker's movie, and
it's a traveler's movie, and it's a person's movie. It's also one
of the very best films of last year.

Apr 30, 2007 18:02:32

Review 4 of 18

4of 4 Stars

To me there is something extraordinarily entertaining, even tranfixing, about the way that Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu manuevers between the oft-tricky pillars of race, money, religion, sex, politics, etc. With his latest globe spanning epic - this also wraps up a trilogy that included Amorres Perros and 21 Grams - he examines the seemingly endless gaps that can seperate people and the seemingly endless lengths a person would go to cross that boundary, that wall of miscommunication and dislocation.

The director was lucky: he was gifted with one of the most diverse casts ever and actors who are willing to go to places, to hint at things rarely seen (I dare you not to be equally repulsed and saddened by Chieko's permiscuity). And though I couldn't possibly explain every twist and turn in this movie I will lay out the characters, as a sort of road map to the tragic world envisioned in the complex script by writer Guillermo Arriaga:

-Richard (Brad Pitt) and Susan (Cate Blanchett) are two wealthy American tourists touristing in Morocco.

-Amelia (Adriana Barraza, radiating all sorts of good feelings) plays nanny to Richard and Susan's two children: Mike (Nathan Gamble) and Debbie (Elle Fanning).

-Chieko (Rinko Kikuchi, quietly stealing every scene she's in) is a deaf-mute Japanese girl stewing away in a pool of regret, lonliness, grief, and arousal after her mother's suicide.

Now pause for a moment...

You can almost here they bang! as their lives collide. What starts out as one solitary gun shot blossoms into a world-wide "terrorist incident" and somehow the audience is swept away into a film that is as beautiful as it is powerful. There are missteps and assumptions, lies and tears, a wedding and a rave. and there is noise. Lots of mindless, desolate noise. The sounds of a world that is either to depraved or to stupid to care about anything but itself. Inarritu invites us to cut through all the babel though and be understood.

Of course, as the movie says, to be understood first you must listen.

Mar 3, 2007 15:26:32

Review 5 of 18

4of 4 Stars

Art is about portraying a message. Babel does exactly this. I had no idea what the word Babel meant before I read this review. I still got the message that was being portrayed in the movie though. The message I got out of it all was that we need to start taking the time to learn about the people outside of our American box. Don't let different languages and cultures be a barrier. Open your eyes to the other side of the story. This is an amazing movie and it can break your heart into a million pieces if your mind is open enough to put yourself in another persons shoes.

Mar 1, 2007 11:37:13

Review 6 of 18

1of 4 Stars

What a waste of time! I had a group over to watch this in my home theatre and I was the only one who watched the entire movie. Worst Oscar-candidate since The Piano -- no this movie was worse. The "Towering Achievement" review you gave Peter convinced me to buy this DVD. The only Towering Achievement seems to be your total acceptance of the PC Hollywood culture -- and I was raised in San Francisco. We are supposed to believe a deaf girl's only sanctuary lies in turning into a sexual puppet and an eleven year-old boy can hit three targets with a scopeless hunting rifle that he’s only fired 8 times? The border crossing story was just as ridiculous -- you don't think there was an easier way to handle the crossing with two gringo children that she helped raise and they trusted? Instead of giving more meaning to the positive bond created by these two cultures (expressed in the interesting images of the trip across the border and the wedding) it ended up being demeaning. The only positives were the performances of Amelia, Chieko and some of the minor characters (man who assists Brad, younger brother that shoots the rifle better, Chieko's best friend) all did a very good job. Horrible does not begin to describe this story. I kept waiting for this movie to gel and it only fell apart.

Feb 24, 2007 13:43:28

Review 7 of 18

2of 4 Stars

I had high hopes for this film but was left a little dissapointed. Even with the time lapses in the movie it was still pretty straight forward and a tad coincedental. The actring was good and the direction fine, but there just didnt seem to be anything gripping about it. It was a good effort to make a mediocre story into something better but thats all it was. If you liked 21 grams, Traffic or Crash then you'll like this.

Feb 21, 2007 18:15:48

Review 8 of 18

1of 4 Stars

Crap! Pure Crap! This is not good enough of a movie to be up for Picture of the Year. This is crappy knock off of "Crash." Everything looks good, but there is poor character development, confusing timelines, and plenty of undeveloped situations.

Feb 21, 2007 11:11:55

Previous Next