Vin Diesel shows off his mediocre acting skills in another bad action film.

Movie Review

'Babylon A.D.'

By: Jesus Butler

Posted: 9/8/08

Babylon was an ancient city in Mesopotamia, the ruins of which are buried far below modern day Iraq.

As I watched "Babylon A.D.," I found myself thinking a similar fate would be appropriate for this failed attempt at a sci-fi opus.

Vin Diesel portrays the awkwardly named Toorop with stereotypical grit. Mélanie Thierry tries her best to be enigmatic and virginal as Aurora; and Michelle Yeoh phones in her performance as the believable if uninteresting mother-hen Sister Rebeka, who tags along to keep an eye on Aurora.

The story is set in the always ominous "not-too-distant future," and revolves around Toorop, a mercenary who must smuggle young Aurora and her guardian across Russia, and into the United States. This task proves difficult, as the group's path is fraught with numerous foes who want them dead for a variety of reasons.

The stage set in the opening sequence is a grim one: street vendors peddle automatic weapons in shanty towns set up along rundown city streets. The message is that humanity isn't doing too hot, a situation that young Aurora's safe passage to New York is somehow supposed to remedy.

Once the plot is established, the film gets light on story and heavy on action, which isn't necessarily a bad thing for a sci-fi action flick. Unfortunately, it does happen to be a bad thing for this particular flick, thanks to uninspired sequences shot with some of the shakiest cameras known to man. Half the time you can hardly tell what's happening on screen, and the other half of the time you can't really be bothered to care.

As the story trudges along and more exposition is deemed necessary, the actors are given a chance to show their chops … and fail miserably. A scene in which the three leads are holed up in a tent for the night in an arctic wasteland has got to be one of the most awkward attempts at character development I have seen in recent American cinema.

Once our heroes arrive in New York, it's time to begin unloading all the plot points that were alluded to but never fleshed out earlier in the film. I won't go into details, but be sufficed it to know it's not satisfying. The threads which are tied up feel rushed, as if explanations are being pulled out of the air just to get things over with. I left the theater wondering what exactly was supposed to have been accomplished in the end.

"Babylon A.D." is too bogged down with bad acting, poor writing and unimpressive action sequences to ever take flight. Even the director, Mathieu Kassovits, has taken issue with the film, claiming 20th Century Fox altered it significantly, removing integral plot developments. Given what is there, however, I doubt an extra 10-20 minutes of footage could have made it much more comprehensible.

There is an underlying feeling that the film is meant to send some sort of message, but the exact message was lost somewhere along the way. It is as if the producers took elements from films such as "Children of Men," "Minority Report," and "The Fifth Element," then didn't know what to do once it was all assembled.

If you really need an action sci-fi fix, go rent one of those fine films instead of blowing your money on "Babylon A.D."

jbutler@unews.com