Babylon

Babylon follows a loose ensemble of characters as they move through Hollywood at the end of the silent era, when the rise of talking pictures upends careers and reputations. The film shifts between the reckless ambitions of an aspiring actor, the volatile stardom of a rising woman performer, and the faded glamour of an aging leading man, showing how success and excess feed into one another. Parties, scandals, and career gambits pile up as each character tries to carve out a place in an industry that rewards spectacle, but that transition to sound forces new compromises and harsh reckonings without revealing the final outcomes.

Damien Chazelle directed this period epic, which draws on historical Hollywood lore and influences from Kenneth Anger, delivering a sprawling, stylized take on late 1920s filmmaking and celebrity culture. It premiered in 2022 with a high-profile release and wide studio backing.

The film's commercial run was mixed, opening with lots of attention but failing to match its large scale with consistent box office returns. It earned strong interest from certain audience segments while leaving others cold, producing a polarizing financial picture compared with its ambition.

Babylon sparked many conversations about depictions of excess and moral decay in entertainment. Some scenes and character moments became reference points in discussions about Hollywood's past and present, and performances by Margot Robbie and Brad Pitt were often singled out in cultural commentary. The film's wild sequences and unapologetic decadence kept it in headlines and social feeds long after release.

Critics were divided, with many praising its technical bravura, period design, and energetic performances, while others criticized its length and tonal unevenness. Viewers gave it a solid audience score, reflecting a love-it-or-hate-it reaction, and the film keeps returning in conversations about ambition, fallout from rapid technological change, and the personal costs of spectacle in show business.