Blu-Ray DVD Movies: BaBeL

BABEL is the crowning achievement in the trilogy from the unstoppable creative pairing of screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga and director Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu,
which also includes AMORES PERROS (2000) and 21 GRAMS (2003).
The movie focuses on four interrelated sets of situations and characters, and many events are revealed out of sequence.
The following plot summary has been simplified, and thus does not reflect the exact sequence of the events on screen.
The movie's first plot is interspersed with scenes of Richard and Susan. They came on vacation in Morocco to get away from things and mend their own marital woes.
The death of their infant third child to SIDS (this is the implied cause) has strained their marriage significantly as they struggle to communicate their frustration, guilt, and blame.
When Susan is shot on the tour bus, Richard orders the bus driver to the nearest village with a doctor (the village is named Tazarine in the film).

Main characters Pitt and Blanchett leave their two children in San Diego to spend quality time in Morrocco. Blanchett is shot by a stray bullet coming from a Morrocan goat farmer son who is testing out a new rifle. She almost dies while she is waiting to be transported to a hospital. Their trip gets extended and the Mexican housekeeper who is watching the two children has a son who is getting married immediately in Mexico. She has no one to watch the children so she takes them across the border for the wedding.

Nearly every performance of the film is devastating, offering an intimate, emotional experience that would approach melodrama if it weren’t rendered so realistically.
Cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto’s color palette masterfully captures the muted tones of the harsh natural landscapes of Morocco and the Mexican border, as well as the fluorescent lights of Tokyo that denote another, though equally barren, end of the spectrum.
The misunderstandings born of cultural, language, and class barriers are on par with those that occur between family members, depicting a world that, while connected in the least expected of ways, is also faced with a deep-seated crisis that threatens to alienate humanity from itself.