Why Babylon is Brilliant

Okay so the time for Babylon came and went, the movie released and it went overlooked and underappreciated and then the Oscar’s came and it went overlooked and underappreciated again. But I think there are very specific reasons for both. And both the reason society overlooked Babylon and the reason the academy overlooked Babylon are the reasons why Babylon is brilliant and should be treated as such.

Now for details about the films casting, story and pacing you can go look at my review. What I am going to do here is dive into why this movie caused such a guttural reaction in all who saw it. People either loved or hated it and everyone seems to feel very strongly one way or the other.

Let's start with society as a whole. Now I really hate when film bros brush off negative opinions of their favorite movies because “you just didn’t get it”. Movies as a medium are for the masses, they aren’t overly intellectual and most of them spoon feed you their themes. They aren’t difficult to understand. Not a single Quentin Tarantino movie contains any interpretation that you have to search for, Fight Club is very straightforward and easy to understand. That said however I say to the general public, if you didn’t love Babylon, you didn’t understand it. I think this comes from films about film being loved by only those who enjoy film. And I mean love it as an industry, as a process, as a medium. Not just something to do to kill time. The masses that most movies are for don’t care how these films are made, they don’t want to watch the process and they certainly don’t care about the emotional and mental impacts that the industry has on those who work in it. They also don’t like being confronted with the fact that by indulging in the industry by watching these films that they are enabling it to keep crushing people. It's a vicious cycle but the reality is that if people didn’t spend money on movies the industry wouldn’t hold as much power as it does.

So why didn’t the academy like the movie? We already mentioned that filmmakers love movies about making movies. So what about it turned off the academy so much? Well that’s simple, Babylon wasn’t just a fun movie about what it's like to make films in the industry. It was a very gritty commentary on what the film industry does to people. When the film wrapped up and everything led back to Manny watching Singing in the Rain the film was showing us the audience that Hollywood will always make something beautiful. What it was showing Manny was that the beautiful thing the audience was seeing was born out of something painful and tragic and by people who ripped their lives apart to be a part of the film industry and its magic and wonder. And though the journey itself isn’t always pleasant or easy it will always result in something beautiful. Now it's not the most flattering portrayal of the industry is it? However what the academy seemed to miss was that despite all of that people are still going to clamor for a place in the industry. Because nowhere else can we create that much raw emotional impact. It doesn’t exist anywhere else.

The movie is truly a work of art, it's brilliant and for it to be overlooked because the industry professionals voting didn’t like what it said about them is a little funny just because it proves the point of the film. So it's ironic but still upsetting.