Babylon (2022)

Fair warning: some spoilers in this review.

My friend and I went to see Babylon today at a local theater. Before the movie, two of its stars - Margot Robbie and Diego Calvas who plays "Manny" - introduce the movie and assure us - the audience - that we're watching the film "the way it was meant to be seen - on the big screen and then they say "we hope you enjoy Babylon".

I hoped so too since it's a 3 hour long movie. But really was curious about it since it was about old Hollywood and the seedy world behind the scenes, from the same director who made La La Land. I didn't love that movie because it ended on such a depressing note. It made me never want to watch it again, even though I liked some of the dancing scenes and set pieces. That was 6 years ago.

After watching Babylon, I never want to watch the movie again, except for maybe a few scenes that I really liked. For example, I really liked the scenes where the outdoor silent movie scenes were filmed. There's a camera pan sequence that shows all of the different movies that were being made on the same outdoor lot - a bar scene, a jungle scene, a battle scene, etc. There was a similar scene in Peter Bogdonovich's Nickelodeon (1976) which also was about silent filmmaking. 

In the first 5 minutes of Babylon, there's a scene in the desert showing how an elephant is being pushed up a hill to be an attraction at a Hollywood party. And then we see it's anus shoot out a gush of wet dung and squirting all over two people pushing the truck uphill. Am I enjoying the movie yet? 

What I thought might be a true ensemble film (like a Robert Altman film) really isn't. It focuses primarily on 3 characters and how they react to the transition from silents to talkies. 

The character of Manny, a Mexican immigrant who becomes a servant to one of the studio heads and later works his way up to an executive, is one of the three major stories told. 

The other prominent stories are of white actors played by Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie. Their characters are very similar to those of Jean Dujardin in The Artist (2011) and Jean Hagen in Singin In the Rain (1952), respectively. In The Artist, the lead character thinks of killing himself, and even points a gun to his head (before his dog saves him). But in Babylon, Brad Pitt actually uses it on himself. Tragic. But not unheard of for actors to do that. George Sanders and George Reeves were two examples. In Babylon, we sort of get a sense of what let the Pitt character to pull the trigger.

There were two other very interesting characters that were in the movie that I wished had gotten more to do in the film. In fact, both of their stories would make for a great feature film, I think.

The first is a Black trumpet player who first starts out as a musician on the studio set and playing at lavish parties. He then works his way up to be an early film star like Dizzy Gillespe or Cab Calloway (their names are not mentioned, but the movie heavily implies this could be part of their story). The other is a singer / supporting film player and studio staff member that is a characterization of Anna May Wong. A different name is used but we get the idea that this is partly her story, too. 

Great idea here - how about a long overdue biopic of Anna May Wong for a change? I think we're ready for her story in 2023!  And lets see more films about the early Black films of the early 1930s. Let's see a movie about The Nicholas Brothers, for example. 

There's even a female director on the silent movie set, which I suspect is a tribute to Alice Guy-Blaché, who did make silent films. At one point in Babylon, the director character even utters Alice's trademark line "Be Natural", which is the same name of the great documentary on Alice's life. But no biopic of hers has ever been made either. 

In the final analysis, my friend and I both felt that the character types played by Robbie and Pitt have been told many times in other movies. 

This film focuses on the tragic stories behind the transition from silents to talkies, but it's so long, and the gross-out humor is over the top. At the same time it is self-indulgent tribute to old Hollywood. Unfortunately, what's left out are the other stories of actors who succeeded the transition like Lilian Gish who lived to be almost 100 and had great acclaim in the "talkie" era and beyond. 

Sigh. I really wanted to completely enjoy this movie, and even love it. But in my opinion, it's unfocused, it's way overly sentimental at the end, and it's missing so much. Another blogger, Self Styled Siren, also did not like it. 

This new blog post from Bobby Rivers talks about Babylon and I agree with his assessment of the film, too. (I tend to agree with Bobby most of the time in his movie assessments)

Another perspective by Surrender to the Void.

Another vlogger that I usually agree with is Deep Focus Lens, who loves musicals more than I do. In their video review of Bablylon they use the phrase "thematically muddled", and also they emphasize how the characters "don't exist in the times they live in", and compare it to Boogie Nights and Casino where some parts they don't  like (and are "awkwardly inserted") and some they do. Check out the revie below:

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Robert Altman's A Wedding (1979)

Robert Altman's A Wedding is a humorous wedding satire where a blue collar girl marries into a wealthy family with mob connections.  The humor is a bit dark at times, especially when the matriarch of the higher-class family (Lilian Gish) passes away in her upstairs room of her mansion while the wedding takes place downstairs. Another scene involves a car crash.

The film is discussed by several members of the cast and crew in the book Robert Altman: The Oral Biography by Mitchell Zuckoff (2009, Random House), In the book, screenwriter John Considene remembers that Altman wanted to make a film about "The American wedding industry".  Considene and Altman created over twenty characters and numerous story arcs, carefully planned in advance.  Co-screenwriter Allan Nichols remembers, "If anything A Wedding was about gossip and how gossip spreads and how gossip hurts, and how gossip helps and how gossip kills and how gossip kills the right guy sometimes."  In the same book, Carol Burnett (who plays the mother of the bride) remembers that Altman said to the actors "Please if you have an idea for a scene, come to me with it. I want to hear it. Some of the best scenes in my movies have come from the actors' ideas". 

Altman pledged all of his profits from the film to the proposed Equal Rights Constitutional Amendment, although the profits from the film were not much.

With Mia Farrow, Peggy Ann Garner, Howard Duff, Mia Farrow, Paul Dooley, Geraldine Chaplin, Dina Merril, Lauren Hutten and Desi Arnaz, Jr.

Ship of Fools (1965)

The year is 1933. Hitler is now in power. A cruise ship is making its way to Germany.

The passengers include numerous German citizens as well as Americans (including Lee Marvin and Vivien Leigh, in her final film appearance).

It's kind of a long film with several interconnected story lines. A reoccurring theme explores the German character's feelings and attitudes about the changing political climate of the country.

Among the Germans aboard is Jose Ferrer's character, an obnoxious publisher who won't stand to eat with anyone who is a Jew.  Lee Marvin's character (a washed-up American baseball player) observes this behavior and asks someone "What's he got against the Jews?".

Oscar Werner plays the German ship's doctor, and he's good. All throughout the film he's politically agnostic, and later he's suspected of being Jewish. But the truth is never truly revealed to us. Instead, we learn that he longs for something more in life, and he longs to be with Simone Signoret's character, a humanitarian that he admires and adores.

The movie ends by showing all of the characters leave the ship, and the audience is left to wonder what is to become of them all throughout the 1930s and beyond. It's assumed that some of the Americans are just there in Germany for a short visit - Lee Marvin leaves the ship and quickly tries to meet a pretty young blond woman. And we assume that some of the Germans will grow to support the emerging Nazism, including an old woman (who previously showed sympathy to Jews) who greets and hugs her awaiting son - who is wearing a Nazi armband.

A very patriotic and proud German Jew (Heinz Rühmann) views the coming years optimistically, and is oblivious to any of the horrors that will emerge from Hitler's dictatorship. The ship's philosopher, Michael Dunn, says to him at one point "you might be the biggest fool on this ship".

With George Segal, Lilia Skala, Jose Greco, Elizabeth Ashley.
Director: Stanley Kramer

Writers: Katherine Anne Porter (novel), Abby Mann (screenplay)

Fellini's Amarcord (I Remember) (1974)

This is Fellini's Italy as he remembers it when he was a young boy. It's an an ensemble featuring a number of interesting characters centering around teenage Titto, his friends, family and neighbors. Fellini was not a fan of the fascism of the time and we see that in character's reactions to the new developments in the government. The film is like a scrapbook with a number of humorous stories about fascism, the Catholic church, school, and family. For example, Titto has a very grouchy and temperamental uncle and a loving and devoted aunt, and they often argue. These family scenes are very enjoyable. The town has a prostitute, and we get to meet her a bit. There is also a hairdresser character, Gradisca, played by Magali Noël. She's the woman who every man has a crush on, and eventually marries in the end, in a big wedding where everyone in town is invited. There are also funny moments in the classroom and with the teachers.

I really enjoyed this movie very much. I thought of Woody Allen's Radio Days and how similar they both are, and also thought of other coming of age films that owe alot to this film. It is very lyrical and beautiful to watch, photographed by Giuseppe Rotunno the same cinematographer who shot Robert Altman's Popeye, another movie that this reminded me of.

Though much less cerebral than 8-1/2, there are a number of symbolic elements that have kept critics discussing ever since the film came out, including the famous ship scene and the peacock scene. Why do they appear in the film? Well, the ship is a grand construction of Italy (based on the real SS Rex), and is source of great pride to the villagers. The peacock, well, that's not so easy to explain. It's rare appearance suggests royalty or even a angelic spiritual presence. There are a number of wonderful moments like that in the film, including a scene showing a rare snowfall that really happened one year. I haven't heard the DVD commentary yet but plan to because there's so much to enjoy in this, and so much history as well.

Magali Noël in Amarcord

Our instructor for the course was Dr. Constance Markey, who is the co-author of the 1978 book Federico Fellini: A Guide to References and Resources and the author of the 1999 book Italo Calvino: A Journey toward Postmodernism. She has taught Italian literature and film at DePaul University for many years. During our final class discussion, she and her husband brought in two bottles of wine for us to enjoy! It was nice. She taught us a few Italian words and phrases and talked about her travels to Italy, pointing out that many of the settings in Amarcord are still as they look today; she roomed in houses just like Titto's family's house.

She also mentioned that she and her husband went to see the Venice-set The Tourist (which I reviewed the other day here) but didn't care for it much other than for the scenery. She said movies like that don't stay in her head long after the film is over, like Amarcord . I didn't argue with her about it. The Tourist for me I guess is a guilty pleasure I suppose. 

Buon Natale e Felice Anno Nuovo