Babylon AD

The future is bleak with wars and refugees. The world is fit only for hardened mercenary Toorop (Vin Diesel) who lives by a simple code; kill or be killed. The XXX star in this film meets a new challenge as he plans to smuggle a ‘parcel’- a young woman Aurora - from a convent in Kazakhstan to New York City.

Toorop, Aurora (Melanie Thierry) and her guardian Sister Rebeka (Michelle Yeoh) embark on a journey from delipidated Europe, through a refugee camp in ‘New Russia,’ across the Bering Strait, Alaska and Canada, and finally to New York. As Toorop gets to know more about Aurora during their journey he must now decide whether he should handover Aurora - who is the only hope for the survival of mankind - to her ruthless mother. There’s a lot of reasons not to love this film: it’s too shallow. The plot is unclear. We have a young woman with psychic and telekinetic powers but from where she came is a script entirely gone awry. The climax is most upsetting as it makes no sense. The fight scenes suffer from an extremely confused editor. However, the film boasts of the most unpleasant grainy set which is really effective in sending a message that this is not a world that any of us would like to live in. It implores mankind to act and start changing things.

The camera takes are pretty good with characters almost coming down on your face. There are a number of shots to take your breath away.

Overall, the film is supposed to be an action flick with morally binding tale of struggle for survival. But it misses the former while negotiating the latter
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Babylon A. D.
English (A/U)
Cast: Vin Diesel, Gerard Depardieu, Michelle Yeoh, Charlotte Rampling, Melanie Thierry
Director: Mathieu Kassovitz