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Universal Pain In The Cinematic Tower Of Babel

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Universal Pain and the demonization of the other.

Much like Babel, the film Crash presents characters with seemingly separate lives but end up being linked in some way. This intersection is an attempt to demonstrate how people can be separated by many things but are united by pain. The title Babel is an allusion to the Biblical story of how God made people start speaking different languages so that they would not be able to continue building a tower so tall that they would consider themselves greater than God. By making this the title, Iñárritu is creating a sort of “cinematic tower of Babel” with a foundation of a “universal language” to unite those all over the globe (Shaw 23). Although the characters are from different walks of life, their live are intersected through suffering. This is an admirable sentiment; however, this idea of universal pain can be problematic. Using the films Crash and Babel as well some of the the films covered in the course, this essay will attempt to argue how the idea of universal pain can be toxic.
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