Hollywood’s soul-crushing toll on artistic integrity 

By Julia Kern

Babylon, released in 2022 and directed by Damien Chazelle, follows the outrageous and shocking tale of the rise and fall of multiple characters in 1920s Hollywood. The film stars Diego Calva as Manny Torres, a starry-eyed young man with a passion for filmmaking who is eager to do anything to make his dream a reality. This 189-minute fast-paced, extremely shock-value-filled epic does not drag for one second. If you’re easily squeamish, particularly bothered by an extensive amount of piss and shit, or freaked out by a creepy Toby Maguire, you may want to avoid this film. However, if you’re obsessed with Hollywood lore and filmmaking in general — as I am — I encourage you to power through some of the more intense scenes.

To give a broader overview of the film, it follows three major characters. Jack Conrad, played by Brad Pitt, and Nellie LaRoy, played by Margot Robbie, and the aforementioned Torres as they live in the ever-changing landscape of Hollywood. 

Conrad is a successful silent film actor who, at the beginning of the film, is at the height of his career and ends with his life and career slowly sizzling out, as new actors come onto the scene leaving him in the dust. Something that stands out to me about Conrad’s character, and what he represents, is the immortality of fame. There’s a poignant quote near the end of the film where Conrad angrily confronts a journalist, Elinor St. John, who wrote a story about his fall from grace as an actor. However, in reply to his outrage, she reminds him of his legacy.

“In a hundred years, when you and I are both long gone, any time someone threads a frame of yours through a sprocket, you will be alive again. You see what that means? One day, every person on every film shot this year will be dead. And one day, all those films will be pulled from the vaults, and all their ghosts will dine together, and adventure together, go to the jungle, to war together. A child born in 50 years will stumble across your image flickering on a screen and feel he knows you, like… like a friend, though you breathed your last before he breathed his first. You’ve been given a gift. Be grateful. Your time today is through, but you’ll spend eternity with angels and ghosts,” said St. John (Chazelle, 2022).

I know that’s a long quote, but I can’t bring myself to cut it down. It just perfectly encapsulates the feeling and message of this film. It’s something I think about every time I watch, read, or listen to some form of art. I think about the faces, voices, and stories that would’ve been totally forgotten if it weren’t for this recording representing a flicker of that life.

Laroy is also an interesting character and shares similar themes to Conrad’s and Torres’ characters. Laroy starts the film as a wannabe actress, trying to get herself noticed at big-shot Hollywood parties. Later, she becomes quite successful as a silent movie actress, but then in the latter half struggles with the transition to talking films. However, her struggles aren’t only with her acting; she battles addiction, along with finding it hard to fit in with the classier side of Hollywood, due to her party-girl persona getting in the way of anyone liking her. 

Laroy is consistently mocked in the film. Whether that be in the beginning when nobody believed she could become a star, or how she acted in high-brow events, or when she couldn’t adapt to talking in film. Laroy represents wanting something so bad, getting it, and then losing it because of a mixture of self-sabotage and not being able to fit into Hollywood’s environment. All Laroy wanted was to be a star — and she got that. Although in contrast to Conrad’s slowly sizzling out career, Layroy’s burns hot and fast.

Torres embodies an important theme and a core message of the film: no matter how hard you try or how perfectly you follow the rules, sometimes it’s just not enough. This theme is driven home by the film’s ending, which I won’t spoil in detail, but due to circumstances beyond his control, Torres is forced to leave his Hollywood career behind and settle into a normal life. Years later, he returns to Los Angeles. He watches a screening of Singin’ in the Rain, a film about the transition from silent movies to talkies. Ironically, the film mocks the very reality that Torres experienced. As the audience laughs, Torres weeps, devastated to see his former hopes and dreams reduced to a joke by the industry he fought so hard to be a part of.

Maybe I sound too much like a jaded old man. Maybe it’s because I listen to too much Bob Dylan and identify a little too much with Tony Soprano. The truth of the matter is, I do have a pessimistic look at what it means to become a successful artist. It’s all because of the corrupt industry in which art must be produced to become successful. Hollywood is far from the rose-colored point of view most of us have, Babylon illustrates that. However, that doesn’t stop me from daydreaming about living my life as a successful artist. I think that will forever be my dream, even though it will only just be that — a dream. 

Julia is a journalism major at Cal Poly Humboldt. She loves film and is a regular on Letterboxd. To quote Robin Williams in her all-time favorite movie, Dead Poets Society, “The powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?”