Babel

I'm going to start off by saying I thought this movie was mediocre. I think there were some great performances, but overall, it wasn't tied together well. First off, this was directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu. He's done some great stuff like 21 Grams and Amores Perros. I respect the guy. He does good work. Actors include Gael García Bernal, Adriana Barraza, Kôji Yakusho, Cate Blanchett and Brad Pitt. These are all great actors. The story - now here's where I have the problems. My first impression, from the previews and the "buzz", was that this was similar to Crash. Maybe I didn't give this a fair shake, but let me know what you think. The film Crash was about a bunch of different people with different lives, of different races and of different socio-economic classes. All of them resided in the LA area and all of them were connected through one circumstance or another. All of them were important to the story and you got a peak into each one of their lives. The film Babel is centered around an American family and a few other people that are somewhat connected to them and/or the story. During and after the movie was over, I was left with a feeling of, "why did I need to care so much about them?" This wasn't quite as extreme as in The Fountain when you never found out why it was so important Hugh Jackman's wife lived, but there was nevertheless something lacking. You find out only a little bit about the American family through snippets of conversation but that's it. The film is mainly based on the circumstances of what is happening. The circumstances were very important and quite dire, but at the same time I feel there is value to making the audience feel connected to the characters. The story of the girl and her father in Japan felt very much like a "dangling shad" of a Florida election ballot to me in reference to the plot. The father is connected because of a weapon, but that's it. His family is also messed up due to the death of his wife but if that whole part of the movie was cut, I don't think the story would have changed much at all. Their story might have been fulfilling some stylistic element or something, but I think it could have been cut or beefed up in some way. If it had been cut though, I feel like the movie would have been even more lacking because then the story/plot isn't very unique at all. I felt like there needed to be either something else connecting the Japanese family to the American family or another character and/or circumstance to add to the Japanese part. As I said before, performances were great, but that doesn't make the movie great. I think films like Monster and Ray are other examples of that. You may totally disagree with me here, and if you do give me a comment. I'd love to discuss this film with you. I think this this movie had a lot of potential, but it just fell short in my eyes.