Babel babble

Over the holidays I saw "Babel," a film that's sparked a lot of critical conversation--good and bad--since its release. Dana Stevens (of Slate.com) has it on her top ten list and calls it "virtuosic," while David Denby of the New Yorker calls it "hopeless," despite "fearless [acting] performances." The film's basic theme (although the review itself is far more superlative than necessary) is best summed up, I believe, by Peter Travers of Rolling Stone:

“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.

Visually, linguistically, physically, everything in "Babel" is about miscommunication, spoiled intentions, and missing pieces. Unlike other reviewers, what struck me about "Babel" was its ultimate optimism. Despite all the noise, individuals in "Babel" form deeply affectionate bonds. After their tour group strands them in a remote Moroccan town, Richard and Susan (played by Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett respectively) are forced to trust their caretakers despite their differences. Understanding, Inarritu tells us, is forged not by speaking, but by listening to what is fundamentally similar underneath all our linguistic differences.

Much has been said about Rinko Kikuchi's stunning performance as Chieko, a deaf-mute Japanese youth whose mother's suicide has forced her to move in with her distant father. Much of "Babel" surrounds familial relations as a method of uniting characters in common experiences. Inarritu even alludes to economic/post-colonial divides by creating hope for the American and Japanese players while destroying the lives of Amelia (the Mexican caretaker of Richard and Susan's children) and of Yussef (the young Moroccan boy who shoots Susan) and his family. "Babel" is heavy and even burdensome, well-crafted and stunningly directed and acted, heart-wrenching and beautiful. If you don't buy that, at least believe me that it's worth seeing.