Babel (2006) review

Sounds suspiciously like dime-store chaos theory: If a Moroccan kid fires a bullet at a bus driving tourists around, accidentally injuring an American in the process, does that have an effect on the life of a businessman in Japan or his deaf-mute daughter? Iñárritu says "of course!" in the last of his trilogy of films (beginning with Amores Perros and 28 Grams) that stretch themselves dangerously thin trying to seem profound but only come across as blatantly 'scripted': this might sound delightful for an 800-page novel with lots of twists and turns and fluff in-between, but on screen with its condensed time frame just seems abrupt. Still, it's arguably the best film of his trilogy, and the performance by Rinko Kikuchi - desperate for any kind of physical love - is so beautiful it deserves its own movie, instead of being reduced to unfulfilling fragments in this one (oh, and while I'm thinking of it, if she still needs someone to smother her with affection - because those Japanese men are simply too tactful and refined - you know where to find me, I can watch anime for hours, our ages are pretty close and so on and so forth...).