The hyperactive editing got extremely tedious for three hours. Especially when it would happen right after a genuinely good scene. Many scenes were long or didn’t need to be there. Ex: The opening party did not have to be that long for people to understand the debauchery. The snake scene? What was the point just for some slapstick humor. Everything with Tobey McGuire.

All the characters story lines are scattered for the purpose of large set pieces or obnoxious yelling chaotic dialogue scenes so no one gets a real character arc that we can experience. The black and Asian artists barely getting any form of a character arc.

And that last scene specifically the colors and editing was obnoxious. It went from celebrating movies to just loud noises and colors.

Wolf of Wall Street (which this gets compared to a lot) is leagues ahead as it

1. Focuses on one character and their rise and fall.
2. The debauchery is not 20 minute scenes.
3. We actually get time to see the downfall with the investigation rather than in Babylon when it jumps years.
4. It shows the consequences and doesn’t try to play it as a feat like Babylon does with Manny smiling in the end. This is just me but having him cry is a more powerful mission statement and then you can slowly pan to someone else watching the same movie with a smile (maybe they are watching a movie with Brad Pitts character) and then it ends keeping the hurt manny feels but also validating the great speech brad Pitt is given about legacy