Monday, June 11, 2007

Babel

MINOR SPOILER ALERT (nothing major, more plot-oriented)
Saw it. Didn't like it much. Thought the story was way too disjointed, so much so that I failed to become emotionally involved with any character. Okay, maybe a bit with Amelia the nanny, but not nearly as much as I could have and wanted to be. Way too many messages crammed into it as well. There was the language barrier message (thus the name). The media frenzy message. The "quick to judge" message. The illegal immigrant message. The gun message. The "dealing with grief" message. I'm sure I can come up with a handful more. Morality is fine in a movie, but to me, the movie can't be about morality. It needs to be about the people. Give me some characters I can care about. The entire sequence that took place in Japan was completely unnecessary. The stuff in Morocco and the stuff in Mexico were logically tied together. The time spent in Japan could have been spent exploring the depths of the other characters -- Pitt, Blanchett, the kids, Amelia the nanny and Garcia-Gernal. Instead we got scratches on the surface, that's all. This movie could have been so much more, especially because it featured some stellar acting. Instead I was left dissatisfied and unmoved. Very disappointing.

3 comments:

Cheezy said...

Your review of 'Babel' is in agreement with the other stuff I've heard about it from a few of my friends. I might give it a swerve then.

It's a shame, because Gonzalez-Innaritu's career started so well, with the (IMO) brilliant 'Amores Perros'...

Jodie Kash said...

Hey Kos, OT...but every time I open your blog I got a pop-up, "Internet Explorer cannot open the Internet site http://blog.boileddinner.com/. Operation aborted." You gots your abortion topic ;) but I need to refresh several times to get in and read you. I'm IE v6.

Don't know if anyone else has issues with ya.

Kos said...

Hmm... I have no idea why that would be. Lemme see if I can do a little research...