Babel

[cron]

it looks too good. this time iñarritu and arriaga won't disappoint (me).

[Pubrick]

i know. even though arriaga's still a jerk, it's a formula that works for iñarritu. he could polish any old turd from arriaga and make kusturica think it's pie.

[rustinglass]

that was tommy lee jones, P.

[Gamblour.]

i know. even though arriaga's still a jerk, it's a formula that works for iñarritu. he could polish any old turd from arriaga and make kusturica think it's pie.

I didn't understand any of this. But is the title "Babel" actual a very layered pun, being the Biblical reference and a reference to Douglas Adams' Babelfish.....or is Adams' Babel fish a reference to the Bible? In any case, I just figured out something new for myself.

[RegularKarate]

is the title "Babel" actual a very layered pun, being the Biblical reference and a reference to Douglas Adams' Babelfish.....or is Adams' Babel fish a reference to the Bible? In any case, I just figured out something new for myself.

"Babel fish" is a biblical reference.

fuck yeah, language.

[pete]

I think babel is a reference to the language translation service babel fish, which the novel got its reference from.

[RegularKarate]

I think babel is a reference to the language translation service babel fish, which the novel got its reference from.

and the translation service is a reference to the post that you just now posted right there, just now.

[modage]

from Premiere...

"The title's of course referring to the Tower of Babel," says Pitt, "where God gave everyone different tongues-the frustration of communication, and the failure where people couldn't talk to each other."

[MacGuffin]

Travel and tribulations
Alejandro González Iñárritu rounds off his "trilogy" with "Babel."
Source: Los Angeles Times

He calls it "the trilogy in my trilogy," but Alejandro González Iñárritu isn't just playing a clever numbers game.

Do the math: The Mexican director's new film, "Babel," like his breakout hit "Amores Perros" (2000), is a unified story told in three interlocking parts. But its logistical ambitions surpass those of "Amores Perros" and his other feature film, "21 Grams" (2003), neither exactly a slacker effort.

Set in four countries (Morocco, Japan, Mexico and the United States), "Babel," opening Oct. 27, has four sets of interlocking protagonists, struggling to communicate in half a dozen languages (Spanish, English, Japanese, Arabic, Berber and sign language). The multinational cast mixes marquee Hollywood stars (Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Gael García Bernal) with lesser-known talents, such as Japanese actress Rinko Kikuchi, augmented with a large number of nonprofessional performers.

Pitt and Blanchett play American tourists whose lives are turned upside down when two Moroccan boys accidentally shoot at their tour bus in a remote desert region of the African country.

Meanwhile, the couple's two young children embark on their own high-risk adventure with their Mexican nanny. Through a series of coincidences, these interwoven tales eventually loop back to the saga of a rebellious, deaf-mute Japanese girl whose father may be implicated in a mysterious death.

Leo Tolstoy, in "Anna Karenina," observed that while happy families are all alike, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own unique way. "Babel" attempts both to flip, and universalize, Tolstoy's famous adage.

"What makes people happy in Morocco or Japan or the United States, it can be very different," says the director at his Culver City offices. "But what makes us miserable and what makes us sad is exactly the same for everybody. What exactly is the tragedy of not being able to love, of not being able to receive and absorb love. And the vulnerability that we have for the ones that we love. Those things are universal no matter who you are. That is when we share that empathy. That's what I discovered in this film."

The movie's title obviously alludes to the Old Testament story in which God "confused the tongues" of men because they had defied him by trying to construct the massive Tower of Babel to glorify themselves. God's punishment was to divide humanity by making people speak different languages.

"Babel" updates the biblical allegory by addressing some of today's burning global issues: immigration, the cultural clash between East and West, and the spiritual confusion that many privileged First World-ers feel.

"I want to talk about, I would say, these big-scale kind of things but from the intimate universe of a couple, of Brad Pitt, of the [Japanese] father and daughter," Iñárritu says. "I don't want to make a film about politicians talking in their offices. I don't care about that."

The main theme of "Babel," Iñárritu says, is the same as for the other two films in his "trilogy." "In the end, you can talk philosophically and socially and politically," he says. "But the bottom line for me is: 'Babel' is just a simple film about four intimate stories about parents and sons — that's it."

[MacGuffin]

Pitt humbled by non-actors in "Babel"

He's one of Hollywood's biggest stars, but Brad Pitt says he enjoyed taking a smaller role as part of an ensemble in the new film "Babel," and was humbled by the work of several nonprofessional actors in the film.

Directed by "21 Grams" director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, "Babel" made its North American debut at the Toronto International Film Festival this weekend.

An intense tale of four interlocking stories spread across three continents, the film was a favorite at the Cannes film festival earlier this year and is generating Oscar buzz.

"Being a part of an ensemble is always more fun, you don't have to carry the film," Pitt told reporters in Toronto on Sunday, one day after throwing fans into a frenzy at the red-carpet screening of the film.

"For me, I consider myself more a citizen of the world, and I have great pride as I sit up here with all the people from different cultures, and know that we all came together," he said.

Pitt stars alongside Cate Blanchett as a couple on vacation in Morocco when tragedy strikes. Their story is linked to that of two shepherd boys living in a remote village, and also to two narratives taking place at the U.S.-Mexican border near San Diego, and in Japan.

Pitt's and Blanchett's scenes were filmed on location in Morocco, and Inarritu used several non-actor locals to fill out the cast, which he said was the most difficult challenge he had faced as a director.

He singled out one scene in which Blanchett's character needs medical attention, and the only help available is the village veterinarian.

"We were in this room with the veterinarian who stitched up Cate, and he was the real veterinarian of that town. His hands didn't smell so good, because he came from some goat surgery," he said.

For Pitt, who during the news conference brushed aside a suggestion he had become an icon, the experience was humbling.

"How easily they picked it up and understood what they were trying to get across. ... I was just pretty surprised. It took me down a notch as well," he said.

HIGH POWER, LOW PROFILE

Pitt has kept a relatively low profile since the birth of his daughter, Shiloh, with Angelina Jolie in May, and he did not appear in Cannes.

His has been the most sought-after face at a Toronto festival already boasting considerable star power with the likes of Russell Crowe, Jude Law, Sean Penn, Penelope Cruz and Jennifer Lopez.

At the news conference on Sunday, the moderator twice chided photographers to "calm down" so Pitt's answers could be heard over the sound of clicking cameras. That prompted Pitt to wave his hands and mug for the photographers.

"That's the picture that's going to end up when I have breakdown or something ... if I get arrested for a DUI (drunken driving charge) later on, make racial slurs or something," he joked.

Inarritu said he considered the film at its core to be about parents and children, a theme that resonated with Pitt.

"It becomes the one thing that keeps you up at night, how can you protect your children? It's less about yourself, and it's more about the kids," he said.

Pitt added fatherhood would definitely influence roles he accepts in the future.

"I'll try to be a little bit more mature about my decisions, but this one I'll be proud for them to see, once they're old enough to really understand it."

"Babel" is scheduled for limited release in October.

[I Don't Believe in Beatles]

Bay Area Xixax members:

This is playing at the Mill Valley Film Festival on October 8th at 4 PM. 

SPOTLIGHT AND RECEPTION $50 BABE08P
SPOTLIGHT ONLY $25 BABE08R

"Please join us for the Spotlight Award program, featuring the screening of Babel and an interview with Alejandro González Iñárritu.  Following the Spotlight program, we move on to the new Smith & Hawken store at Strawberry Village Shopping Center for a party in honor of the talented director.  The celebration features delicious food from Perry's Gourmet Catering and fine Northern California wines."

http://mvff.com/node/1892?PHPSESSID=0409c5219c9fe55311eda066a6baee97

Advance tickets aren't available anymore (fuck me for only discovering this screening today) but the film is in "RUSH STATUS."

"...Rush tickets are typically available for screenings that have gone to Rush Status.

A line for each Rush Status screening will form outside the theatre prior to the screening. Approximately ten minutes prior to the screening, available Rush tickets will be sold on a first-come, first-served basis to those in line.

There are NO DISCOUNTS on Rush tickets and sales are CASH ONLY."

So there's still a (small) chance of getting in. 

[MacGuffin]

Creatively brilliant, but tensions simmer
Alejandro González Iñárritu and writer Guillermo Arriaga are apparently at odds.
Source: Los Angeles Times

Will an Oscar run end the long artistic alliance between Mexican director Alejandro González Iñárritu and his countryman, screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga? Their brilliant collaborations have thus far given us the intricate and intense dramas "Amores Perros," "21 Grams" and "Babel," which hits theaters Oct. 27. Along the way, they have become one of the most distinctive creative partnerships in dramatic filmmaking.

But long-simmering tensions about who is claiming responsibility for the success of the pair's films have recently bubbled over. Though no one is speaking publicly, several of the people invested in the two artists and their project are privately aghast that Iñárritu, apparently miffed that Arriaga claimed much of the credit for the critical success of "21 Grams," banned the writer from attending Cannes, where "Babel" had its world premiere. Iñárritu, in full "auteur" glory, went on to claim the best director prize. Multiple calls to Arriaga's UTA agent went unreturned, Iñárritu's manager would merely confirm the ban and acknowledge the feud, and a message left for Iñárritu sits idle.

Now "Babel," which stars Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett and Gael García Bernal, is on the verge of exploding into Oscar season ("Perros" was nominated for best foreign-language film; "21 Grams" pulled acting noms for Benicio Del Toro and Naomi Watts), and no one knows whether the creators will buddy up to do the film's publicity.

Fans of the duo's work tend to think of them as a cohesive unit, one perfectly blended, deeply powerful cinematic voice. Iñárritu, who helps develop the original ideas, clearly finds Arriaga's writing fertile ground for his many directing talents, and could even be said to rely on it since he's never made a major feature with any other writer. The director himself has said Arriaga spent two years working on "Babel's" incredibly complex structure.

This seems like the kind of snowballing crankiness that will suddenly evaporate the moment one of them has another good idea over cold beers (then again, more Oscar recognition could blow the rift even further out of proportion). But if they do decide to dissolve the partnership, Arriaga could always push his future work into the hands of filmmakers such as Tommy Lee Jones, who movingly directed "The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada." Which, incidentally, won Arriaga the best screenplay award at Cannes last year.

[MacGuffin]

Babel: Writer vs. Director
Source: Hollywood Reporter

When Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu visited my UCLA Sneak Previews class last week to talk about Babel, I asked about his falling out with writer Guillermo Arriaga. The director asked that he and Arriaga be remembered for the fruits of their collaboration, the trilogy they had worked on for nine years, beginning with Amores Perros, through 21 Grams and finally, Babel. Now their relationship "has run its course," he said, and they are ready to move on to other things. Arriaga wrote Tommy Lee Jones' The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada and will be directing his own movies now.

I was curious about the non-linear structure of the stories in the movie, how they seem to fluidly move back and forth in time, building to emotional crescendos. How much of that was detailed in the script? About 70 %, he said. "The script was a great and solid base from which to start." He rewrote about 30 % 40 %, and took out 18 to 20 scenes.

How much of the movie was found in the editing room? He found things to shoot on the fly on location, for example. He had the sense that the Moroccan story with the two boys who shoot an American tourist (Cate Blanchett) came to an end too early in the film; he wanted more. So he cut in some shots that he had taken on a gusty day of the boys facing into the wind, along with some other atmospheric shots that he thought might be useful at some point. He had no idea how he would use them.

Working with the actors was crucial, of course. He doesn't like them to overthink things. When they get stuck, he makes them use numbers instead of words, to get to the essence of the emotions they are trying to convey. He wants to dig down to bare authenticity, to break them down.  He raved about Mexican actress Adriana Barrazza, whom he had worked with on Amores Perros, who had experienced some heart trouble in the past but still soldiered on without taking a break,carrying a child in the desert heat, so that he would get the footage he needed in one day.

He finally broke down and hired professional actress Rinko Kikushi after he had insisted on finding a real deaf actress who was as good as she was—and couldn't. When Kikushi came back a second time she was signing fluently and he cast her on the spot. (I didn't know that deaf people sign differently in every language—and thus can't communicate with deaf people outside their own country.) Her character's need to use her body to communicate was not about sex, he said, but about seeking affection the only way she knew how. "The urban desert can be the toughest to survive," he said. "You can feel lonely in Tokyo even when you're surrounded by people."

[Pubrick]

(I didn't know that deaf people sign differently in every language—and thus can't communicate with deaf people outside their own country.)

is that an aside by the reporter or from iñarritu? i'm guessing the reporter. they should learn to keep stupid comments like that out of their articles.

[pete]

arriaga is a terrible writer, it's fairly obvious who is the better of the duo.  there are always these awful moments in their movies (and the collaboration with tommy lee jones) that goes for the worst kind of contrived melodrama, thinking it as some kind of brilliant serendipity.  they have ruined the previous three movies arriaga worked on.  dump that cheesy sack of balls.  without good sensitive directors, arriaga's scenerios don't seem anymore different from dozens of Tarantino imitators out there--it's just that he happened to write for melodrama instead of gangster pics.

"You can feel lonely in Tokyo even when you're surrounded by people."

yeah, not like a terribly overrated tour-de-shit hasn't been made about that subject already.