Sick to my stomach
Ugh. Talk about bad cinema experience.
It turns out the shiny new Canberra Dendy Cinema isn't all monster bigscreens :(
We went to see Babel last night for Luke's B'Day - first thing that went wrong was the incorrect session time. Not only did the movie not start at the internet advertised time of 9pm, it didn't even start at the session board time of 9.10. No, it started at 9.40pm!!
After almost an hour of loitering in Borders we couldn't find Luke which wasted only a few minutes before we went to be seated. But the session had sold out. Although it wasn't wall-to-wall patrons which was consientious of them, only the front row had more than single adjoining seats.
HOWEVER, whoever installed the front seating row (probably the front 5) was more conscientious of profits than the ill effects of humans packed like sardines. I had to sit as straight as possible to crane my neck onto the edge of the stiff non-reclining chair. Of course I don't expect cinema chairs to be reclinable, but when you then have to elevate your head so far that you are looking at the apex of ceiling and screen, it certainly would have helped. As it was, I felt for certain that a reservoir of blood and bile was pooling in the back of my head for the 2 hours odd the film endured. And endured is the word of choice. What follows below must be read in the context of a seating position that eventually caused me to feel physically ill.
The film concept is about the clash of different culture and language which in itself is a decent idea. However the multiple stories don't hold water let alone attention, hence the need for three equally flimsy storylines to distract from one another. Unlike most multiple story line films, these narratives do not interlink with each other in anything other the most banale and contrived methods. Literally, one story is linked only by a minor charachter having in a past life gifted a rifle to a safari guide, another is linked by the charachters in that story being parents and employers of the nany and children in the last plotline. Apart from those links, there is no intermixing, no emotional consequences and no dynamism between any of the plots.
The emotional content of the film should arise from the unfortunate circumstances of innocent people who fall victims of misunderstanding and accident. To a degree it succeeds in this. But as soon as dickhed, retarded, too stupid for words charachters exacerbate their situations the movie quickly falls into farce instead of escalating the emotion. Who shoots at police when outnumbered and outgunned and 10 years old? Who the hell takes pot shots at buses and cars? Who flees from racist, trigger happy border guards when all that is at stake is a drivers license? These charachters do.
Finally, the constant use of shaky steady-cam shots, blurred close focus and fukin blaring speakers in the boxy little cinema coupled with the all too often whining soundscape that acompanied the vision, steadily contributed to my feelings of nausea throughout the film. Although Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett both give good performances, all the more impressive with the scant material, the film is effectively an ok idea, poorly polished and thought out, wrapped in too many layers of 'clever' directorial effects. An unfinished film at best.
Labels: 'film review, 'movie review', babel, dendy
posted by lordstok @ 2:15 PM
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