Babel – An inability to communicate a need for attention because of language, cultural, gender, and generational differences is the wi-fi of connection in this movie. In Arabic, Spanish, English, Japanese, and sign language realistic characters (no one looks like an actor) express their frustrations in an interplay of woeful stories from Morocco, California, Mexico, and Japan in director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s intensely gripping film of tragic misunderstandings.

An American couple (Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett) on vacation in Morocco become victims of a random act of violence. Two Moroccan boys experimenting with their father’s recently acquired rifle, which eventually connects all the principals, unintentionally wound an American female on a tour bus. American authorities over-react thinking this has been a terrorist attack, and the Moroccan police employ brutal measures to find the culprit. Meanwhile back in San Diego, the Mexican nanny (an illegal immigrant) of the couple’s two children decides to take the boy and girl to Mexico with her to attend her son’s wedding after the children’s father calls to say he and his wife will be delayed in their return without giving explanation or allowing the nanny to explain her need to leave for Mexico. (We hear this telephone conversation early in the film from the San Diego home and again late in the film from Morocco.)

In Japan a deaf-mute teenager struggles with her feelings of self-worthlessness and the memory of her mother’s suicide. (“The only countries with higher official suicide rates [than Japan] are Sri Lanka … and the former Soviet republics and their Eastern European satellites …,” writes David Samuels in The Atlantic.) When the police question her about her father’s whereabouts, she thinks they are once again investigating her mother’s death. From Morocco the shot fired at the tour bus is heard around the world.

Click here for links to places to buy or rent this movie in video and/or DVD format, or to buy the soundtrack, posters, books, even used videos, games, electronics and lots of other stuff. I suggest you shop at least two of these places before buying anything. Prices seem to vary continuously. For more information on this film, click on this link to The Internet Movie Database. Type in the name of the movie in the search box and press enter. You will be able to find background information on the film, the actors, and links to much more information.

Copyright © 2007 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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