Babel

Last night I went to see the film BABEL with some friends and first of all, I would recommend it to anyone with a spare $10 and a couple of hours of free time. The film is beautiful, with magnificent scenes from various continents and it is visually magnificent. The music is wonderful and the cast is great (I've never really been a Brad Pitt fan before, but his short amount of screen time in this film is actually really good). I love Gael Garcia Bernal and was pleased with his performance, but saddened by his small amount of screen time. The cast as a whole is great, even the kids.

Anyway, I wanted to discuss this type of movie. I'll try to not spoil it for those of you who want to see it. The film is constructed like Crash. The film has storylines that connect at the end, despite all the major characters being on different continents and living very different lives. I find this very interesting in terms of the narrative. Jumping between all the plots leaves the audience in suspense about one plot, then creates suspense for them in the next one. I love this style of filmmaking. Films that have a straight-forward, linear narrative often have scenes that are slow, or not as enticing and I often lose interest. This choppy, non-linear style keeps drawing the audience back into the film and with this film, the variety of characters and scenes is amazing. Offering this wide range is beneficial, as it gives a wide variety of scenes, a wonderful ensemble cast (much like Crash), and different aspects for audience members to relate to. I find it very interesting that this type of film has gained such popularity and prestige.

One last interesting thing about this film. There is a large controversy about the auteur. Apparently the screenwriter and director got into serious arguments about the film and the authorship of another film they worked on together, 21 Grams. Reportedly, the director, González Iñárritu, claimed sole authorship of the films. Of course, this upset the screenwriter and the authorship debate has created many issues. It even got to the point where González Iñárritu would not allow the screenwriter (sorry, forgot his name) to attend the Cannes Film Festival where the movie was first shown. Pretty interesting battle that directly relates to our discussions of Authorship and Film. IS the director the author?? Or is it impossible for a person to claim sole authorship over something like a film, which needs such a large number of people in order to properly function? Clearly, we still don't know what defines an author.