Babylon (2022)

IMDb plot summary: A tale of outsized ambition and outrageous excess, it traces the rise and fall of multiple characters during an era of unbridled decadence and depravity in early Hollywood.

Directed by Damien Chazelle. Stars Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie, and Jean Smart.

Babylon is Damien Chazelle's movie from 2022, a giant sprawling three-hour epic about early Hollywood, specifically the transition from silence into talkies. We follow a few different key figures: a young Mexican security guard who finds himself rising through the ranks, and two stars who do not adjust particularly well in the transition from silence to talkies. Notably the first 25 minutes is an enormous decadent orgy party at a producer's home, and it continues on this big decadent road. A lot of this works, although both this and La La Land show me that Chazelle is not my ideal crafter of movies about movies. I like the ensemble casting here, but I can't tell if I love or hate the strange absurdist tone in the latter half of the film. There's a scene toward the end where one of the characters watches Singin' in the Rain in the 50s, where the characters are very much reminiscent of these two actors who were not able to make the transition smoothly, and it makes the comedic scenes hit in a different way. I both loved and hated that. It did have the emotional punch needed, but I also felt very aware that the entire movie had been written for that scene, and it was hard to hold that awareness without at least a little eye rolling. The three-hour runtime is also a LOT. You could tell this story just as effectively in two. There are a lot of great individual scenes in this (I particularly enjoyed a confrontation between Brad Pitt and Jean Smart), but it's so long, and the ending does hit you over the head in a way doesn't feel like our long journey had been fully justified.

🎥 Babylon (2022)

📊 Ranked #1406/4219 on my Flickchart

🎯 Flickscore™: 67

beat Dunkirk (#2157 → #2158)

lost to Miss Saigon: 25th Anniversary Performance (held at #1130)

beat Sin Takes a Holiday (#1642 → #1643)

lost to Shadow of the Vampire (held at #1386)

beat Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio (#1515 → #1516)

beat How to Train Your Dragon (#1450 → #1451)

beat Duck Soup (#1418 → #1419)

lost to Death by Hanging (held at #1402)

beat Under the Skin (#1410 → #1411)

beat Child's Play (#1406 → #1407)

lost to Summer Stock (held at #1404)