BabelLanguage is both the avenue of interconnectedness between people and the barrier that divides different cultures and nations. Babel is a multilayered drama about various people across the world, bound together by the thinnest of connections after an accidental shooting of an American tourist in Morocco. These connections only become apparent with time, but they represent a greater network between humanity and speaks to universal needs and commonalities that people have--be it security, love, or fear--no matter their culture or language.
|
|
Babel contains four different plot threads, and they are not told in chronological order. Director Alejandro González Iñárritu adds an additional layer of tension to subsequent scenes through dramatic irony, as the events of one thread may be revealed or hinted at in advance of the corresponding plot line. Each of these four stories is hinged around at least one crisis. There is the story of an upper-middle class American couple--Richard (Brad Pitt) and Susan Jones (Cate Blanchett)--on a bus tour through Morocco. They are struggling to reconcile their fractured relationship, hinted to be due to the loss of a child from crib death. Richard and Susan are unaccustomed to travel in a third-world nation, and their "ugly American" sides creep out, like when Richard crumples under the stress stemming from Susan's gunshot wound. This accidental injury was not the result of terrorists as is speculated by an uninformed and precipitous media, but by a pair of ignorant goat herding kids. In a bout of sibling rivalry, Yussef (Boubker Ait El Caid), and his older brother, Ahmed (Said Tarchani), fire on the bus from up on a mountain, unaware of the dire consequences. Their father, Hassan (Abdelkader Bara), who traded for the rifle from another man, Abdullah (Mustapha Rachidi), in order to fend off jackals harrying his herd. Richard and Susan's tour bus is diverted to a small village in the mountains, where they desperately try to get medical attention and are cut off from civilization. Meanwhile, their live-in Mexican nanny, Amelia (Adriana Barraza), is pressed to take Richard and Susan's children--Debbie (Elle Fanning) and Mike (Nathan Gamble)--to her son's wedding in Mexico, accompanied by Amelia's adult nephew, Santiago (Gael García Bernal), who has had some prior run-ins with the law. On the other side of the world is the story of Chieko (Rinko Kikuchi), a deaf-mute high school girl, who is struggling with the death of her mother and her burgeoning sexuality. Feeling ostracized by most boys for being different, she takes increasingly provocative and dangerous steps to lose her virginity. All of these stories would be acceptable in and of themselves in a feature film; layered together they speak to the common values and feelings shared by people from various cultures and nations.
The trailer for Babel includes a narration by Brad Pitt, describing the biblical myth of Babel--or Babylon--and the discordance of language as a punishment to confuse and divide people for their hubris in building a tower to reach Heaven. Although the languages may be unique from people to people, their problems are not exclusive to their culture. For instance, Chieko is a lonely girl, and her frustration should be familiar to any teenager in her rebellious stages. Add to that a handicap and the emotional trauma of her mother's death, and she begins to slide into an emotional breakdown. When Susan is shot, it is quickly labeled as a terrorist threat, due to the ongoing War on Terror and the heightened state of paranoia in Western civilization; the fact that it happens in Morocco and not the Middle East becomes incidental. Richard's stress level skyrockets and he lashes out at officials and fellow tourists, terrified at the prospect of losing his wife and removed from the comforts of home. This feeling becomes worse when he realizes that this trip to Morocco--and Susan's subsequent injury--was both arbitrary and the result of his attempt to satisfy his own vanity. Amelia is caught in a constant state of impossible choices, beginning with the possibility of missing her son's wedding so she can take the American kids to soccer practice, or bring them across the border and hope for the best. Her choice to take them into a foreign country is a poor one, even if she is constantly trying to make the best out of every situation. As a mother (and mother-figure to the kids), she is sympathetic and trying to do the right thing while under the constant threat of deportation from living in America illegally. But is that enough to justify her poor decisions, like getting in a car with an inebriated Santiago behind the wheel? Of all of the stories, that of Yussef and Ahmed is the most chilling. These two brothers live in a place beyond poverty, where the hint of a naked girl is enough to arouse Yussef, and where his skill with the rifle is enough to drive his brother into jealousy. Their foolishness could be attributed to a failing of their father for not training them about the dangers of the rifle, but how many parents take for granted that their kids won't fire a gun at a bus full of tourists? But Yussef doesn't see a bus full of people when he fires on it--it is just a bus; and his brother convinces him the rifle is inaccurate anyway, due to his own poor marksmanship. When their father tells them of the news, they become increasingly nervous, and things get exponentially worse when the Moroccan police are involved, who show little concern in abusing suspects.
There are moments that speak to the underlying themes of Babel, like when Yussef and Ahmed throw a rock into a shallow pool, and the water ripples outward. It may seem innocuous, but it represents just how significant their ill-fated action is. The shooting represents the fulcrum on which the film's events pivot. These separate scenarios are in varied languages, and the linguistic challenges that arise during them affect how people interact with one another. Richard's stress is compounded by being in a village where he cannot communicate his concerns with the local doctor (who turns out to be a veterinarian), and Chieko must write down her words or sign them, even when her emotions become increasingly delicate. Chieko struggles to find someone who listens to her needs, and someone to whom she can communicate in the language of love and acceptance. Her father, Yasujiro (Kōji Yakusho), tries to help her cope, but struggles to comprehend the strength of her feelings. Consider the scene when Amelia tucks in the children at night; she speaks in Spanish, although they understand her almost completely. It is true that she has raised them for years, but they only speak in English. How could they understand her so well if they were not versed in Spanish? The message in Babel is that even though language may separate us, we are connected by our humanity--and in listening to one another can we communicate beyond these linguistic constraints.
Recommended for: Fans of an interconnected group of stories about people with varied problems, drawn into a kind of "butterfly effect" after a tragic shooting. Babel is a film where the predominance of languages becomes a background detail, because of the broader human themes that emerge during the assorted plots.
The trailer for Babel includes a narration by Brad Pitt, describing the biblical myth of Babel--or Babylon--and the discordance of language as a punishment to confuse and divide people for their hubris in building a tower to reach Heaven. Although the languages may be unique from people to people, their problems are not exclusive to their culture. For instance, Chieko is a lonely girl, and her frustration should be familiar to any teenager in her rebellious stages. Add to that a handicap and the emotional trauma of her mother's death, and she begins to slide into an emotional breakdown. When Susan is shot, it is quickly labeled as a terrorist threat, due to the ongoing War on Terror and the heightened state of paranoia in Western civilization; the fact that it happens in Morocco and not the Middle East becomes incidental. Richard's stress level skyrockets and he lashes out at officials and fellow tourists, terrified at the prospect of losing his wife and removed from the comforts of home. This feeling becomes worse when he realizes that this trip to Morocco--and Susan's subsequent injury--was both arbitrary and the result of his attempt to satisfy his own vanity. Amelia is caught in a constant state of impossible choices, beginning with the possibility of missing her son's wedding so she can take the American kids to soccer practice, or bring them across the border and hope for the best. Her choice to take them into a foreign country is a poor one, even if she is constantly trying to make the best out of every situation. As a mother (and mother-figure to the kids), she is sympathetic and trying to do the right thing while under the constant threat of deportation from living in America illegally. But is that enough to justify her poor decisions, like getting in a car with an inebriated Santiago behind the wheel? Of all of the stories, that of Yussef and Ahmed is the most chilling. These two brothers live in a place beyond poverty, where the hint of a naked girl is enough to arouse Yussef, and where his skill with the rifle is enough to drive his brother into jealousy. Their foolishness could be attributed to a failing of their father for not training them about the dangers of the rifle, but how many parents take for granted that their kids won't fire a gun at a bus full of tourists? But Yussef doesn't see a bus full of people when he fires on it--it is just a bus; and his brother convinces him the rifle is inaccurate anyway, due to his own poor marksmanship. When their father tells them of the news, they become increasingly nervous, and things get exponentially worse when the Moroccan police are involved, who show little concern in abusing suspects.
There are moments that speak to the underlying themes of Babel, like when Yussef and Ahmed throw a rock into a shallow pool, and the water ripples outward. It may seem innocuous, but it represents just how significant their ill-fated action is. The shooting represents the fulcrum on which the film's events pivot. These separate scenarios are in varied languages, and the linguistic challenges that arise during them affect how people interact with one another. Richard's stress is compounded by being in a village where he cannot communicate his concerns with the local doctor (who turns out to be a veterinarian), and Chieko must write down her words or sign them, even when her emotions become increasingly delicate. Chieko struggles to find someone who listens to her needs, and someone to whom she can communicate in the language of love and acceptance. Her father, Yasujiro (Kōji Yakusho), tries to help her cope, but struggles to comprehend the strength of her feelings. Consider the scene when Amelia tucks in the children at night; she speaks in Spanish, although they understand her almost completely. It is true that she has raised them for years, but they only speak in English. How could they understand her so well if they were not versed in Spanish? The message in Babel is that even though language may separate us, we are connected by our humanity--and in listening to one another can we communicate beyond these linguistic constraints.
Recommended for: Fans of an interconnected group of stories about people with varied problems, drawn into a kind of "butterfly effect" after a tragic shooting. Babel is a film where the predominance of languages becomes a background detail, because of the broader human themes that emerge during the assorted plots.