Damien Chazelle’s dazzling new film starring Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie opens on Wednesday, January 18.
In the mid-1920s, Hollywood was not yet the universal dream machine it was supposed to be, but a peaceful destination for all the more or less shady adventurers and other aspirants to fame who thought they could be. tycoons or movie stars – an industry then booming.
Silent films are made in spades, and the greatest sexual freedom still reigns in this wild land (we’re in the so-called “Pre-Code” era, before censorship descends on the city). This is where Damien Chazelle sets up his cameras and captures the twists and turns of the three characters. Folly, Sublimeness and Decline. Many (Diego Calva), a Mexican manager, Nellie LaRoy (Margot Robbie, in a hair-raising slay), starlet ready for anything, and Jack Conrad (Brad Pitt), stars at the end of his career as Hollywood switches to talk TV.
Babylon opens with a stunning orgy scene, Dante’s Inferno, highly politically incorrect, shot with remarkable virtuosity. These absorbed, scandalous and absolutely fascinating Hollywood exegetes will have fun recognizing the ghosts of Fatty Arbuckle, Anna Mae Wong (the first inclusive star in history), John Gilbert, Ramon Novarro and the other Clara Bows.
In this Hollywood, without faith or law, we drink, we sleep, we take drugs, we commit suicide. Babylon not a happy ending movie like it used to be La la plot of land. It’s all a lot, often bloated, but the moments of bravery are impressive, and the final declaration of love in the cinema in the background; Let’s sing in the rain! certainly gorgeous, but with a happy nostalgic enthusiasm.
Source: Le Figaro
