Babylon (2022)

Score: 3 / 5

Babylon is a wild ride. Damien Chazelle's latest is also his largest, a massive and immersive cinematic experience of excess. In every way that La La Land was a sentimental look at making it big in Hollywood, this is the dark, wicked underbelly of that dream. It all looks glamorous and fun, especially from the outside, but this film delves deep into how much work and sacrifice "the biz" can be, especially for those whose broken dreams and desperation lead them to increasingly dangerous new paths.

The film immediately introduces us to Manny Torres (Diego Calva in a star-making performance), a Mexican immigrant in Los Angeles trying to deliver an elephant to a party. It shits all over one of the delivery drivers, and we see everything. It's this unabashed "fuck you" Chazelle gives us right away to set the tone of Babylon, a movie that pulls no punches with its nasty, icky, and bizarre depictions of all things taboo. By the time he gets to the party -- at a Kinescope Studios executive's mansion -- he sees it in all its Gatsby-like flair, in which an elephant is hardly the most gobsmacking element. It's a full-on bacchanal, dripping with drugs and booze, blasted with loud jazz, with the main ball room serving as a an orgy. Again, we see pretty much everything, as Chazelle pulls us though the middle of the party in long takes with a swiveling camera (thanks to cinematographer Linus Sandgren for some truly unforgettable visuals). It's Chazelle's Caligula, and time will only tell if this will be remembered as infamously. I suspect it will.

I could spend paragraphs talking about various aspects of this film. Its stellar cast -- including Jovan Adepo as a jazz trumpeter, Li Jun Li as a queer cabaret singer, and especially Jean Smart as a gossip journalist -- with no few notable cameos are a lot of fun. Apart from Calva, Margot Robbie leads with her usual panache as an aspiring actress and Brad Pitt shines with an almost too-personal level of gravitas as an actor on the way out. I would have liked to see more of his story, as it was just about the only thing that grounds this movie emotionally. What plot exists in this three-hour escapade hinges on the end of the silent film era, as "talkies" began making big waves; but this is hardly The Artist or Singin' in the Rain. And so, even though Tobey Maguire's shocking and uncomfortable extended cameo near film's end is well worth the wait, there is just too much muchness to discuss in this film. So that's really what I want to talk about.

(Vis-à-vis the cast, I do want to praise composer Justin Hurwitz's score for isolating recurring themes for each character that really help connect things thematically and emotionally through this odyssey of chaos.)

Babylon, if it weren't orchestrated on such an immense budget and with such big names attached, should be considered something like an experimental film. Chazelle, who also wrote it, has crafted a series of vignettes with few through-lines to connect them other than a general aesthetic of chaos and excess. Each is almost standalone in its incisive assault on our senses and on various specific aspects of the industry. Perhaps nowhere is this more obvious than a magnificent sequence probably an hour or so into the film in which Robbie, Pitt, and everyone else amasses in a desert field owned by Kinescope to shoot several movies at once. The insane reality of a live shoot on location is hammered home by the frenetic editing, bombastic score, lurid colorscape, and fevered performances; by the end, we feel as exhausted as everyone on set must feel. Its effect? To show us a Hollywood film -- with all its glamor -- that ultimately makes us feel sick; this is not the usual inspirational "dream it, be it" a-star-is-born movie.

In fact, I'd argue it often deliberately tries to ruin our opinion of itself by drawing special attention to bodily functions and fluids. Much like the elephant shit that opens the film, the film treats us to plentiful vomit, urine, blood, venom, etc., to the point that by its end -- paired as these elements are with grotesque imagery, vicious language, and bonkers new ideas -- I felt thoroughly drained and crushed by the sheer weight of manipulations thrown at me. And that's surely by design, as it is no doubt similar to how many of the characters (and real-life Hollywood workers of the time) felt about major studio climates, working conditions, and the impending threat of new media to displace their craft. Even on a purely verbal level, the film all but drowns us with actual historical detail and wacky urban legends to the point that the whole thing just zings with ambivalent energy. Not unlike Tarantino's Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood, you're never exactly sure if things should be funny or cringey, and who exactly the butt of each joke is meant to be.

And that's why the film, ambitious and huge and memorable as it is, doesn't really work for me. I'm all for a story about collapsed dreams and personal compromises against the glitz of pre-Golden-Age Hollywood, but we've had these before. One with so many tendencies toward a real narrative that doesn't actually follow through on that narrative can't maintain my attentions for such a long runtime, not even with spectacle coming out the wazoo. It doesn't help that the final act of this film desperately injects the experience with contrived urgency and moralistic lessons; it's all about the dangers of doing drugs in the industry and how deeply in trouble you can get if you're not careful. Really? One wonders if some producers needed Chazelle to end on a less hedonistic or debauched note, and it rings false not only for his project as a whole but for him as an artist. Otherwise, the idealistic mantra at film's end -- "wasn't it all worth it?" they ask -- lands flat. Which it kind of does anyway. Out the wazoo, indeed.

Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

Score: 4.5 / 5

One of the most exciting entries in the MCU -- amidst an unpredictable slew of new titles, too -- No Way Home is a triumphant third Spider-Man movie. That's a phrase we've never heard before. Jon Watts and his team have crafted what amounts to a DCEU Arrowverse major crossover event, a playful and endlessly entertaining mashup of heroes and villains who react to their circumstances in unpredictable ways. What could have been a logistical nightmare, with so many big names, big titles, and big expectations, is instead energetic, creative, and utterly joyous. That's all thanks to a brilliant screenplay and confident directing, although frankly, I found the editing in this movie bewildering more than once (and that's the only reason it's not scored 5). Until, that is, the final act, which is shockingly emotional.

Beginning immediately after the end of Far From Home, the story launches Peter Parker (Tom Holland) into the public sphere. People on the street know who he is now, and so does the government. Peter, his girlfriend MJ (Zendaya), his best friend Ned (Jacob Batalon), and Aunt May (Marisa Tomei), are brought in for questioning before their charges are dropped, thanks to some quick work by their lawyer. And this, within the first ten minutes of the film, is when I started crying, because lo and behold: Charlie Cox reprises his role as Matt Murdock. Thanks to this applause-generating cameo -- and the presence of Vincent D'Onofrio's Wilson Fisk in the Hawkeye miniseries -- it seems the MCU has reclaimed the rights to their characters from the Netflix shows.

Then there's some basic dramatic hoopla about the kids applying for university and getting denied from all (even MIT!) due to their notoriety. The story in earnest begins after Peter asks Dr. Strange to cast a spell and make the world forget that he is our friendly neighborhood webslinger. Interrupting the wizard's work, Peter fractures the spell by requesting exceptions for MJ, Ned, and Aunt May. It's more than a little annoying to me that Ned is such a central character in these movies, because I find him almost unbearable, but MJ and Aunt May each finally get some really golden scenes in this movie. Not long after the spell, we learn that his meddling somehow caused a rift in the multiverse, allowing other individuals who know Peter's secret identity to access this universe. Thus enters characters from previous iterations of Spider-Man in some of the best-handled retconning I've ever seen.

In what we all feared would simply be a casting gimmick, a huge cast of fan favorites appears spontaneously, wreaking havoc in their search for Spider-Man. The Lizard (Rhys Ifans) and Sandman (Thomas Haden Church) are quickly contained by Dr. Strange, and Peter confronts Doc Ock (Alfred Molina) and Electro (Jamie Foxx). Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe), still wrestling with his split personality of the Green Goblin, makes friends with Aunt May, and works with Peter to rehabilitate the villains. They aim to help these characters rather than simply send them back to the moments of their deaths. It makes for several surprisingly funny sequences of the characters bantering and discussing how to be "fixed." It's not an overcrowding mess, but in fact buttresses this "Home" trilogy's central themes of belonging and integrity and comfort. It's also an effective way of finally allowing Holland's version of Spidey to mature and really grapple with his mantra, "with great power comes great responsibility."

And with the weight of these heroic decisions comes dire consequences. The filmmakers here know this, as they strive valiantly to honor the legacies of previous Spider-Men franchises while more or less correcting our cultural narrative around the intellectual property. Enter, as they do near the halfway point, two other Spider-Men in the form of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield. What I thought would be cameo appearances are actually crucial plot and character points that carry through the end of the film. Their scenes are laugh-out-loud funny, often tear-jerking, and irresistibly welcome, and the writers clearly wanted to honor rather than rewrite their characters, especially in Garfield's case, who was unable to make a third outing as Spidey. One wonders, now, if Sony will attempt to capitalize on his re-entry for their growing efforts to continue pumping out darker Marvel titles. It helps that Venom will apparently now become a shared property, as told by the credits scenes in Venom: Let There Be Carnage and in this film.

Pawn Sacrifice (2015)

Score: 3.5 / 5

I've never been much of a Tobey Maguire fan, but this is one movie where all his little (or not so little) "isms" pay off in an effective manner. In Pawn Sacrifice, he plays Bobby Fischer, World Chess Champion and controversial public figure during the Cold War, with boiling energy and furious resolve. In fact, I was able to watch him so attentively precisely because he plays a character so distinctly unlikeable. In turns pathetic and maddening, Maguire spins a web of paranoia so convincing, it's almost hard to see that it's him and not the filmmakers at all.

And I admire Edward Zwick, but this is not one of his better films. Balanced between drama and thriller, it's too intimate to be Big Picture and too funny to be thrilling. Its rather ostentatious title suggested that this might be this year's The Imitation Game, subtle and harsh with an eye to poignancy. Rather, it feels like a knockoff of that film, but this time with more American silliness and an obnoxious protagonist. Not a good trade. On the other hand, Maguire is playing by a different set of rules, apparently taking his hint from Black Swan or last year's Whiplash in his single-minded stab at weighty character acting. Not that he hasn't tried that before.

Mad props must be given to his co-stars, however, who marvelously parry his every word with generosity and humility. Michael Stuhlbarg and Peter Sarsgaard wonderfully support the action and the pathos of each scene, while Liev Schreiber looms in opposition to Maguire's mania. It's not a showcase for anyone but Maguire, though, who does what we can with his unstable character in volcanic eruptions of high-pitched yells and popped-out veins.

Zwick does manage to succeed in one way The Imitation Game failed: the action of his lead characters and the tone of the film are reflected wonderfully in the "footage" of the period. We see the mobs, hear the music, and get a good look at both American paranoia and European anxiety as they interact with our characters. I think this device works better here because it's presented as media, which it is, and the media already play a large part in this story. Zwick makes it work, and as someone who had no idea about the chess world or Fischer's apparently famed existence, I certainly benefitted from it.

One more thought. I mentioned Whiplash earlier, and that hints at something else I find curious about Pawn Sacrifice. Whereas the former film effectively educates the audience on the world it presents -- that is, even if you knew precious little about music, the film is not difficult to understand in musical terms -- the latter does not. In fact, there is little dialogue describing the game, and even less screen time devoted to depicting the nuances of play. Rather, I think Zwick tries to use chess as a not-so-subtle metaphor for the psychological war between nations during the Cold War and the various subterfuges and feints involved. Taken further, I wonder if he is trying to make a statement about the war, perhaps trivializing the global drama into a single board game that is taken far out of context, disguised in rich trappings, and played by mentally ill divas.

But that might be giving him too much credit. I think this movie is more face-value than that.

IMDb: Pawn Sacrifice