Babylon (2022) Movie Review
Writer and director Damien Chazelle has had a string of hits with Whiplash (2014), La La Land (2016), and First Man (2018). He adds another to his roster with his latest feature film Babylon. For this film, Chazelle returns to his deep love of movies and Hollywood, exploring the silent movie era and the advent of talkies. Within the first five minutes of the movie, we see someone get pooped on by an elephant and peed on by a fellow human so that should really tell you everything you need to know about what kind of wild ride you’re in for.
The opening party scene is one of the most fun sequences of events in film this year. We meet all of the main players at the party. Manny (Diego Calva) brings the elephant (yes, a real-life elephant) as he vies to get a job in the movie industry. Nellie LaRoy (Margot Robbie) bursts onto the scene also trying to get her name into the mix and meet some important movie moguls. Jack Conrad (Brad Pitt) is one such mogul who arrives to the party late with his wife Ina (Olivia Wilde) who promptly asks for a divorce. Don’t worry, he doesn’t take it too hard. The party is exactly what you would envision a 1920’s party to be. A live band plays the whole time, people have sex willy-nilly, someone dies of an overdose, and there’s a “drug room” filled with all manner of uppers and downers. Manny and Nellie meet and bond over a mountain of cocaine in this room. Things work out for everyone (except the poor girl who dies) as Nellie gets a movie role on the spot and Manny gets a job as an assistant.
From there, we embark on a three-hour marathon of Nellie, Manny, and Jack navigating the world of the movie industry. Too much happens to recap here but there are several standout scenes that deserve to be mentioned. While filming a silent movie, Nellie has to cry on cue repeatedly which she does easily. Margot Robbie is magnificent, leaking tears and then quickly smiling when the camera cuts as if nothing is amiss. After this memorable scene, the camera moves through absolute chaos as multiple movies are being filmed in a giant field. It’s like the wild West of moviemaking with actors running rampant and directors hollering instructions at them. A battlefield scene sees people getting trampled and the director discovers someone has been killed (literally) with a spear. The fast pace, DIY feel is fun and you get the sense of endless possibilities for movie making.
Perhaps the most memorable scene is when silent movies have given way to talkies. Nellie is attempting to make the transition to a speaking role. She is supposed to walk to the center of a sound stage, drop a briefcase, and then recite some lines when the phone rings. It can be hard to imagine how difficult early it was to capture audio and video together in the early days, especially with the digital capabilities we have today. But Chazelle expertly displays how tough this feat was at the beginning with take after take of Nellie going through the motions. Everything that can go wrong, does: Nellie misses her mark, she talks too quiet, she talks too loud, someone coughs, the camera runs out of film, etc. The scene builds and builds with an award worthy performance from P.J. Byrne who perfectly encapsulates the frustrations of the early sound era as he yells at anyone who makes a peep until the veins in his neck begin popping out. It’s chaotic and hilarious while also being historically telling.
The final scene worth mentioning involves Nellie’s father and a band of followers parading through the desert to find a rattlesnake for him to wrestle. In the dead of night, they stumble across one and when her father chickens out, Nellie (drunk and high on drugs) decides to do it for him. When the snake bites her in the neck all hell breaks loose. People strung out on drugs and drunk to oblivion begin screaming and running around. Lady Fay Zhu (Li Jun Li), a bad ass character who is involved with Nellie for a time, takes matters into her own hands. She chugs some liquor, rips the snake off Nellie’s neck, sucks out the poison, and kills the snake. It feels like you’re in some type of drug-induced haze as you watch the utter chaos unfold but it’s entertaining as hell.
There will certainly be those who hate Babylon. It is debauchery to the extreme and some of it is unsettling. But it is so much fun to watch, particularly if you’re obsessed with movies and the history of Hollywood. It’s fun to spot references to old film stars. Nellie is a concoction of many stars in the era but the one most will associate her with is Clara Bow. A director named Ruth (Olivia Hamilton) is clearly modeled after Dorothy Arzner, a pioneer filmmaker in the early days of movie making. References to silent movie stars and the films they made abound and cinephiles will have a blast spotting these Easter eggs and watching the early history of movie making unfold before their eyes. Is there an excess of sex, booze, and drugs in Babylon? Yes. But the blistering pace and multiple storylines help keep things moving and realistically portray the 1920’s as a time of unrivaled freedom of thought and expression. Chazelle tracks the downfall of the wild times perfectly and it plays out beautifully over the course of three hours.
A string of excellent performances comes from nearly every actor in the movie. There are no weak links but it’s especially important to note relative unknown Diego Calva who is the emotional anchor of the story as Manny. He holds his own sharing the screen with powerhouses like Robbie and Pitt (both of whom give award worthy performances). Jean Smart is memorable as gossip columnist Elinor St. John and Chazelle gives her plenty to work with. This is a madhouse of a movie that zips along merrily with twists and turns that are exhausting but wildly entertaining. It likely won’t be a mega hit with audiences due to its long runtime but if you can spare the 180 minutes of your life, you should absolutely devote it to seeing Babylon. It’s wild and over the top, but it’s one of the most fun movies of the year.
You’ll like this movie if:
1. You’re a fan of old Hollywood from the 20’s and 30’s
2. You want a wild ride
3. You enjoy movies about making movies
