Big casts are in vogue, it seems, especially when they are period pieces involving Margot Robbie and have a place name for a title. We only just saw the former Neighbours star opposite Christian Bale and John David Washington in David O. Russell’s (less than great, tbh) Amsterdam. Now, if that wasn’t enough, she’s in Damien Chazelle’s Babylon, which hits cinemas on January 20, 2023.
What’s it about? Your guess is as good as ours, as details are being kept under tight wraps. But we do know that Babylon takes place in Jazz Age Los Angeles (say one thing for Chazelle, the Whiplash and La La Land director loves him some jazz) and follows the fortunes of a number of characters as they wend their way through the dawn of the motion picture industry.
Given it’s a movie about movies, we can expect plenty of nominations come awards season, because Hollywood loves nothing so much as a mirror (for multiple purposes—check out the trailer).
But let’s take a look at that cast! Robbie seems to playing a hard-partying would-be starlet, while Brad Pitt is an ageing leading man (big stretch there), and around them orbit the likes of Diego Calva, Jovan Adepo, Jean Smart, Tobey Maguire, Lukas Haas, Max Minghella, Olivia Wilde, Spike Jonze, Katherine Waterston, Li Jun Li, Flea, Eric Roberts, Samara Weaving, and Phoebe Tonkin. That’s a ridiculously impressive ensemble right there.
Now, we’re flying blind here, but at a guess, Babylon is likely to deal with notions of ego and excess, ambition and ruthlessness, naked hedonism and the price thereof, and the harrowing nature of life in the celebrity goldfish bowl—but we’re only saying that because these sorts of movies always do. We’ll all find out how right we were soon enough.
