Babel - El Stinko Movie

I should know better than to trust the judgement of my sophisticated friends. Several of them recommended that I watch the movie "Babel." I had also read some glowing reviews of the movie.

So, I finally ordered it from Netflix and after having it sit on my desk for a week, I finally found a couple of open hours that I could devote to a movie. As it turned out, two hours wasn't enough. The movie is 2 hours and 23 minutes long. That should have tipped me off.

Anyway, Babel ranks as one of dreariest flicks I've even endured. As far as I could tell, it was three crappy, uninteresting storylines, not one of which was worthy of a half hour television drama, stitched into one narrative, with only the flimsiest connection holding the plots together.

What does an emotionally disturbed deaf-mute, Japanese teenager looking for love have to do with an illegal immigrant domestic worker in San Diego?

The answer: Damned little.

I suppose sophisticates were impressed by the movie's artistry, if you define artistry as tediously grinding every little grain of plot into flour, with odd camera angles, subtitles and an unmistakeable gratuitous injections of caricaturized American oafishness.

I suppose the movie could be considered a success in the same way that PBS measures success - the fewer people you have watching a show is a measure of how high brow it is.

Unless you enjoy self-indulgent navel-gazing convesations about deep meaning in the artful tedium of a confusing and depressing film, don't rent this one.