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Saw Inarritu's "Babel," yesterday with BLANCHETT and

Brad Pitt and a well-known couple of Japanese actors, and the magnificent Latino guy, Bernal.
Disappointing.
Amores Perros and 21 Grams, earlier films of this director, I found inventive, emotionally hard-hitting, and exciting.
Sadly, Babel is none of those things.
A violent event occurs in the Moroccan desert, involving an American tourist, and it tangentially is conncected to two other stories occurring in Japan and California.
But all of the dramatic events connected to the central story are in no way directly related, they seem like conceits to point out the "butterfly flapping its wings affects hurricanes" mullarkey which New Age folks like to go on about so much.
Pitt, as an anguished husband, is a picture of Hollywood acting excess with his overly edgy, explosive, nervous-faced portrayal: I've seen him much better, including in "7even."
Anyhow, this is the kind of film where every action by every principal is "wrong" and which leads to further problems: one restrains oneself with difficulty from getting ahead of the director and screaming aloud in the theater, "Don't open that door!"
Good actors, a talented director... it's truly amazing how such poor, expensive projects "fly."
I'm not, by the way, opposed to simultaneity as a film technique (or big budgets, per se): I enjoyed City of Men, The Constant Gardener, and Traffic.
"Casino Royale" is a much better film...



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Topic - Saw Inarritu's "Babel," yesterday with BLANCHETT and - tinear 08:36:47 11/23/06 (9)


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