Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu‘s Babel, the final installment in what some called his “trilogy of death” (the first two being Amores perros and 21 Grams), opened on 10.27.06. A morose if brilliantly woven tapestry piece about random fates, Babel earned $34,302,837 domestic and $135,330,182 worldwide. It collected seven Oscar nominations (including Best Picture and Best Director … Read more
Late this morning I spent about 90 minutes touring Studio Babelsberg, the oldest large-scale studio complex in the world which last February celebrated its 100th anniversary. I was hoping to see some remnants of Cloud Atlas (Warner Bros., October), the Wachowskis-meet-Tom Tykwer epic that shot here last year, but alas, all the sets have been … Read more
Those damn gringos in the Paramount Home Video art department have made an error — culturally insensitive, clueless — on the cover for the Babel two-disc special edition that comes out on 9.25.07. DVD Beaver‘s Eddie Feng pointed this out in a 7.19 e-mail to Paramount Home Video’s Deborah Peters, to wit: They couldn’t fit … Read more
The Envelope‘s Tom O’Neil is reporting that “one of the best gurus of all — Pete Hammond of Maxim and Hollywood Wiretap.com — [has] just switched his best-pic prediction today from Little Miss Sunshine to Babel.” But if you ask me, it’s a shaky prediction based upon a dry hunch and a sense of Oscar … Read more
The Envelope‘s Tom O’Neil hasn’t joined the Babel club (he’s a confirmed Departed supporter), but in an article called “Babel Rising” he says he’s hearing more and more that Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu‘s film will take the Best Picture Oscar. “I don’t understand why everybody’s saying the best picture race is between The Departed and Little … Read more
I’ve just pulled what feels like a major tea-leaf reading out of my ass, so here goes: Babel seems to have picked up a kind of default Best Picture headwind — it may be more of a stiff breeze than anything else, but you can hear it and feel it in 20 different ways — … Read more
The Bagger (a.k.a., N.Y. Times Oscar guy David Carr) is is looking at language wrinkles regarding Babel‘s eligibility for the Golden Globes Best Picture Drama (which it won), and also the Academy’s for Best Picture and Best Foreign Language Feature. A Paramount Vantage spokesperson tells Carr that 45 minutes of Babel is spoken in English, … Read more
Babel wins the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture, Drama!! Shocker! First shocker of the night! Didn’t see this coming, frankly. Was this just me? I don’t think so. This will provide, hopefuly, a big shot in the arm for ticket sales. Hooray for the team, hooray for Alejandro.
Hollywood Wiretap‘s Pete Hammond is saying with yesterday’s Babel-favoring Producer’s Guild nominations and this morning’s SAG noms, “it may be time to jump on the Babelwagon.” “In Munchkinland when The (Lollipop) Guild spoke, Dorothy listened. In Hollywoodland when The Guild speaks, everyone listens, at least during awards season because, to put it bluntly, the PGA, … Read more
Babel director Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu, N.Y. Times Oscar columnist David Carr (a.k.a., “the Bagger”) at Babel “special screening’ party at Westwood’s Armand Hammer Museum — Sunday, 11.5.06, 11:05 pm; Westwood Village marquee — Sunday, 11.5.06, 8:20 pm; Babel costar Rinko Kikuchi; Mann’s Village theatre — Sunday, 11.5.06, 8:22 pm; Babel costar Cate Blanchett handing red-carpet … Read more
Clearly a small but persistent percentage of the film critic elite are gunning for Babel. This Mark Caro piece from his Chicago Tribune/Pop Machine blog (which has been nicely re-designed, by the way) is an example. Caro thinks Babel is Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu‘s (and Guillermo Arriaga‘s) least impressive film, and yet I’ve spoken to many … Read more
“Before I read any more reviews and start questioning my judgment, I’m going to predict that Babel will be nominated for best picture this year. What’s more, I think it just might win,” says Newsweek‘s Sean Smith in a 10.27 posting. “Why? Because the Oscar is almost always awarded from the heart rather than from … Read more