Babel

More and more I'm beginning to think of Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and the Jean-Luc Godard of Mexico. In BABEL he once again uses his style of taking seemingly unconnected stories and stringing them together, a skill he has mastered and it shows here. The film was nominated out the ying-yang for Oscars yet only snagged the one for best score, deserved, but how it lost out to THE DEPARTED for best picture still has my head shaking. As most have seen BABEL and much has been written about it I feel no need to ramble on other than it is amazing, Brad Pitt didn't need to be here (oddly enough, turned down THE DEPARTED to do BABEL), Cate Blanchett (gawd, does this woman EVER sleep) skips the chameleon routine and plays it straight and despited being Oscar nominated here Rinko Kikuchi is still one of the best "unknown" actresses out there. I had hoped THE BROTHERS BLOOM might have fixed that problem but it looks like it tanked and I've yet to meet anybody who has actually seen it. A dark and beautiful piece of work not to be missed.