Babel

Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu is known worldwide for films such as "Amores Perros" and " 21 Grams" His latest film "BABEL" explores with shattering realism the nature of the barriers that seem to separate humankind.

In doing so, he evokes the ancient concept of BABEL (Babel: n. 1. In the Bible, a famous tower built by a united humanity to reach toward heaven, causing God in his anger to make each person involved speak different languages, halting the project and scattering a confused and disconnected people across the planet.) and questions its modern day implications: the mistaken identities, misunderstandings and missed chances for communication that, though often unseen, drive our contemporary lives.

In BABEL, a tragic incident involving an American couple in Morocco sparks a chain of events for four families in different countries throughout the world. Tied by circumstance but separated by continent, culture and language, each character discovers that it is family that ultimately provides solace.

In the remote sands of the Moroccan desert, a rifle shot rings out – detonating a chain of events that will link an American tourist couple’s frantic struggle to survive, two Moroccan boys involved in an accidental crime, a nanny illegally crossing into Mexico with two American children and a deaf Japanese teen rebel whose father is sought by the police in Tokyo.

Separated by clashing cultures and sprawling distances, each of these four disparate groups of people are nevertheless hurtling towards a shared destiny of isolation and grief. “The best part of shooting BABEL was that I began filming a picture about the differences between human beings – that which separates us, the physical barriers and those of language – but along the way I began realizing that I was making a film about that which joins us; love and pain: what makes a Japanese and a Moroccan happy can be very different, but that which makes us miserable is the same for everybody" In the course of just a few days, the characters will each face the dizzying sensation of becoming profoundly lost – lost in the desert, lost to the world, lost to themselves -- as they are pushed to the farthest edges of confusion and fear as well as to the very depths of connection and love.

This mesmerizing, emotional film was shot in three continents and four languages – and traverses both the deeply personal and the explosively political Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Gael Garcia Bernal, Koji Yakusho, Adriana Barraza and Rinko Kikuchi lead an international ensemble of actors and non-professional actors from Morocco, Tijuana and Tokyo, who enrich BABEL’s take on cultural diversity and enhance its powerful remarks on cultural links and frontiers.

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