An Ugly Dark Twisted Fantasy: Review of ‘Babylon’

Grade: D+

This is the kind of movie that the fictional character Stefon from Saturday Night Live would concoct given if his descriptions were more disgusting and morbid. Throughout, it has elephant projectile defecation, vomiting, snake bites, simulated semen, blood, sweat, and tears (not necessarily in that order).

Somewhere amongst all these emissions, there’s a plot. It is a very stale and predictable one at that. The top four characters in the movie coast along amongst drugs and sex in a full on bacchanal.

Margot Robbie’s Nellie LeRoy is already a star in her own mind before she actually becomes a movie star. This led to the fine decision by writer-director Damien Chazelle to include a female director ála Dorothy Arzner who directs Nellie in a motion picture.

All of the scenes of debauchery seem superfluous and unnecessary. Not only that, they distract from the story which is as thin as the blouses that Nellie wears.

The film tries to do too many things in its three hours plus running time. Another plot thread concerns the trumpet player Sidney Palmer. He is a black man who must confront the racism that was extremely overt during the transition from silent films to sound.

Robbie’s acting is piercing and explosive. Brad Pitt is subtle and understated in one moment and then he changes direction and blows his brains out. The dissolution of his marriages and his waning box office receipts push him over the edge and he just can’t take it any more. So he paints the bathroom with the contents of his skull.

After the clichéd idea of going to Mexico to escape an unpaid debt, Diego Calva as Manny Torres carries most of the film as the supporting actor’s supporting actor.

He breezes through scenes, carries heavy loads of emotion, and then winds up at the end of the movie teary-eyed, staring at a screen displaying better made movies like Singin’ in the Rain (1952), The Wizard of Oz (1939) and Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991).

Without all the distractions, this could have been an excellent film. Instead, Chazelle and company chose to dive into the depravity of the characters. They had to dirty them up with the idea of making the audience feel as if they're superior, superficially, of course. Rather than draw heroes who are larger than life without powers or capes or utility belts, the filmmakers and cast decided to swirl in the gutter like a leaf on a puddle.

Scenes of rats being eaten alive and the savagery and carnal depictions of the early twentieth century show that we haven’t come as far nearly a century later in some moments of the film.

Two remarkable, even revealing sequences of events were the multiple takes due to people entering hot sets, missed marks, too loud sounds, and a sweltering camera booth. Robbie is stunning as an actress trying to remember her lines and stay sane amidst the goings on outside of her control.

The other was the introduction of burnt cork ash for Palmer to apply to his face in order to get the “best effect” for the camera. As his last act in maintaining his dignity, he walks off the set and plays for a smaller, all black crowd. Though his financial situation would never be the same as before, he reads the assignment and places his integrity above all else.

If anything, Babylon is not entertaining. It is a slog to get through the amount of time that Mr. Chazelle asks the viewer.

Whatever the impetus for another Hollywood movie about Hollywood played in Chazelle’s mind, he should have championed his thoughts for his electrifying debut Whiplash (2014) and his glorious sophomore effort La La Land (2016). Alas, Babylon stands as another example of big budgets and small ideas colliding. The crash wasn’t pretty and neither is this movie.