I saw the movie Babel last night. I had really liked Amores Perros but had gotten impatient with 21 grams. I also lost some of my patience watching Babel, especially towards the end when every story line climbs to a crescendo of tears and despair. Blork and I were talking about the movie afterwards (he liked it) and I couldn’t quite find the words to explain what was bothering me about the film. I felt like each storyline, even though very simple, could have been interesting in and of itself, but that putting them together made them lose their interest.
I always like to read reviews after I see a movie instead of before. This review I found in Salon expressed, better than I could, part of my reaction to Babel:
I guess that’s the point: Our actions may have consequences we can’t imagine, halfway around the world; when a butterfly bats its wings a baby is born, and all that. OK, but in the case of « Babel » what that produces is two powerful and intriguing mini-films whose only connection to each other is a third one that’s barely half as good.
My own reluctant conclusion, after three films of González Iñárritu’s career, is that he’s a brilliant, intuitive director who’s also kind of an intellectual lightweight. That’s no crime when it comes to filmmaking; nobody ever accused Scorsese or Fellini or Hitchcock of philosophical profundity either. I hate to criticize anybody for artistic ambition, but the problem with « Babel » isn’t that it’s a bad movie. It’s a good movie, or, more accurately, it’s several pieces of good movie, chopped up in service of a pretentious, portentous and slightly silly artistic vision.
Of course, this doesn’t take anything away from the great performances of Adriana Barraza and Rinko Kikuchi.
Although I liked it, it was definitely a downer. Like I said when the credits rolled « I need some Cute Overload.«
J’ai vu Casino Royal aujourd’hui et j’ai trouvé ça très bon. Bon scénario et bon jeu des acteurs. Les décors intérieurs et extérieurs européens sont superbes comme d’habitude. La dernière partie du film se déroule à Venise. Ça rappelle des souvenirs…
P.S. Il y a un film du temps des Fêtes en ville (un mois à l’avance!) avec un titre qui ressemble à celui de ton film pour ados, c’est « À vos marques, prêts, décorez »! Ils ont peut-être copier votre idée? En anglais le titre est Deck the Halls.
Well, I didn’t like the movie myself. And I was thinking of you when I heard about this movie: À vos marques, prêts, décorez!. What will happen? Will the title be changed?
Wow. I had not heard about that weird translation for the movie « Deck the halls ». I don’t think it’s going to change anything for us since the film is obviously American and shouldn’t bring (I hope) too much confusion with « À vos marques! Party! ». Legally, there isn’t much the producers could do about this.
Amores Perros… oh boy, j’aurais jamais dû voir ça. Moi des humains déchiquetés, je peux trouver ça drôle, intéressant, émouvant, je peux comprendre que ça soit justifié, mais des chiens… NON. Malheureusement ma mémoire pleine de trous avait oublié qu’un ami m’avait avertie de ne surtout pas y aller.