I watched the 2006 movie Babel. This was a very interesting, yet sad, movie. This was a complex movie to watch also. It is four stories that all took place in three different countries: Morocco, Mexico and Japan. At first you wondered what these four different stories had in common. As you kept watching all the stories started to unfold and you come to realize that they all intertwine in an entertaining way. The way they tied these four stories together was wonderful. Each of the four stories focused on children in an interesting way. All gave the same message to protect and care for your children and as much as you try to protect them sometimes bad things happen anyway.
In Morocco: Richard and Susan are vacationing in Morocco while their two children are back home in the United States with a nanny. They are in Morocco to try and grieve for their deceased son who died of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). As they are riding in a bus, Susan is hit by a bullet that came from somewhere outside of the moving bus. Eventually Richard gets Susan to a doctor and from the hospital he calls Amelia.
In Morocco you also have Hassan and his young two sons, Yusuf and Ahmed. Hassan has just bartered a rifle from one of his neighbors in exchange for his goat. He has to leave but he gives the rifle to his sons. He tells them to go kill some jackals because they keep attacking their goats. Once the father leaves, the two boys go to search for jackals. As they play around they start arguing about who can shoot more precisely. As they are standing up on a hill, they see a bus far down on a road beneath them. Boys being boys, they try to see who can actually hit the bus. One of them goes and shoots at. Nothing happens. His brother starts making fun of him saying that he can’t aim. Then the bus comes to a stop.
In the United States you meet Amelia and Richard and Susan’s two little children. Amelia gets a phone call from Richard saying something has happened and he needs Amelia to stay with the children longer. Amelia tells him that her son, in Mexico, is getting married and she wants to be there. He says he needs her to stay and has no one else to watch them. Amelia then decides to take the children across the border so she can attend her son’s wedding. Once the wedding is over she decides to cross back into the U.S. She doesn’t realize that she needs a notarized letter of permission in order to take someone else’s children across the border. As she tries to cross the border with her nephew driving, the border patrol stops them. He asks her for the letter of permission. She doesn’t have it. The border patrol tells them to pull over for a secondary inspection. Instead of pulling over to the secondary inspection, the nephew gets scared of going to jail, he had been drinking at the wedding, and just drives away. With the border patrol in chase, the nephew pulls over and tells Amelia to get out of the car along with the kids. He tells her he is going to lose the cops then come back for them. She gets out of the car. It is already night time. She starts walking with the kids. Tired, sunburned and dehydrated, Amelia and the kids are not doing well. It’s the morning now, she tells the kids to stay under a tree. She will go find help and come back for them. She runs into a border patrol officer. They eventually find the children. The police tell Amelia that she will be deported back to Mexico. Amelia tells them that she has been in the United States for 16 years and that is her home. She has cared for the children since they were born. It doesn’t matter to them. The police call Richard and they decide not to file any charges.
In Japan you have a teenage girl named Chieko. Chieko is a deaf mute who only communicates by reading lips and writing down what she wants to say. She is traumatized from seeing her mother commit suicide by shooting herself in the head. As she is trying to get over her mother’s death, she starts acting out. She is sexually frustrated and eventually ends up exposing her naked body in their apartment to a policeman that is investigating her wealthy father. You come to find out that the police are investigating her father for a gun that was used in a shooting in Morocco. He had given the gun to Hassan as a thank you gift for taking him out shooting and for being his guide.
There is a lot to this movie. Everything was interesting. I loved how all the stories were connected. One part of the movie that I liked is when after Susan was shot how the news media reported on it. The news media in the United States immediately reported it as an American was shot in Morocco and it was a terrorist attack. The mainstream media is too quick to report stories without getting complete information. Nowadays, ratings go up as to who can report a story the fastest.
I saw this movie awhile back and I really liked how the stories intertwined with each other. Reading your post brought back all the different emotions that I felt in viewing this movie. The sadness for the mute girl, I felt like she craved attention and became sexually promiscuous because she was hurting, the poor nanny taking a chance to get to her sons wedding with the american children and the struggle she went through to get back into the US and Susan being shot on the bus while being in a foreign country away from her children and trying to get her to a, so many twists and turns. Great post, excellent movie.
I have to see this movie! It is interesting how the shooting was reported as a terrorist attack even though it was just two kids.. being kids. It is disturbing that the real media is like this!
This does sound very interesting. It sounds like a good lesson on stereotype and discrimination. I would love to see this even more so because the advancement of the plot sounds so interesting.
I like your post! You’ve made it sound so interesting I want to watch it. I love those multiple story line movies that all tie in together at the end. I feel bad for Ameilia with the lack of knowledge of the laws and the consciences of her actions. Laws can be very tricky and even after living her for 16 yrs how would she know she couldn’t take the children with her to the wedding. It’s lame how some good people get screwed.
I enjoy these type of films. It’s like trying to solve a puzzle as you watch. Chieko’s father gifting his guide the rifle sets off the whole chain of events. This moment has a huge effect on people’s lives. It’s Life. I wish I could see how my most random decisions affect others. This plot development is depicted in films such as Contagion and Crash. I’ve never seen this movie but based on your review, the cast and director, it must be good.
I saw this movie when it first came out in theatres and I loved it. These types of movies are fascinating. Alejandro González Iñárritu does an amazing job of laying out the stories and tying them all together. It is interesting to see how in there are no bad guys in this movie rather there are victims of circumstance and destiny. The chain of events in this move show how sometimes things will happen in a certain way and at the moment we have no explanation as to how or why things had to happen that way. What this film made me realize is that all of our actions matter; not only do they affect us but they transcend us and reverberate and touch the lives of others in ways which we might never know. Your analysis of this film helped me remember detail I had already forgotten. Thanks!
Alejandro González Iñárritu es un orgullo hispano! 🙂
I have not seen this film, can’t believe this film was release close to 10 yrs ago. It’s sad how our situation has not improved such as how quick we are to name any situation a terrorist attack and how people are treated while crossing the border. Before this class, I didn’t really pay too much attention to details in regards to how different cultures are portrayed. I mean I do see them and recognize them, but rarely acknowledge them. Not sure if you get what I’m trying to say. But this class and these blogs have given me a different perspective/outlook on films. You should have a “spoiler alert” awareness regarding Japan. As I saw the trailer, I couldn’t get how Japan was connected in this film.
I have heard of this movie but had no idea what it was about. The phrase “six degrees of separation” comes to mind with this movie. Who would possible think that a gift from a client living in Japan would be used in a random shooting in Morocco to a possible deportation and abandonment of American children in Mexico and possible starting an international skirmish when this random shooting is considered possibly terrorism. With every action is a reaction.