Babylon

Since his debut feature Shallow Grave in 1994, Danny Boyle has proved one of the most exciting, versatile filmmakers of his generation, showing a willingness to take risks and experiment with projects as diverse as Trainspotting, 28 Days Later, Sunshine, 127 Hours and Slumdog Millionaire.  Most recently, Boyle has directed a TV pilot, with the rest of the season to be shot later this year. Babylon, a comedy-drama about London’s police force undergoing an image makeover from an American public-relations expert, should be first-rate entertainment. It just isn’t.

Brit Marling plays Liz Garvey, the cool, blonde communications expert hired by Chief Constable Richard Miller (James Nesbit). Her first day on the job coincides with a series of random shootings across London. As she strives to keep ahead of developments and get the best of resentful underling Finn (an enjoyably smarmy Bertie Carvel), the police force tracks down the gunman and struggles to make sense of contradictory orders from upper management.  

The action is well-handled but hardly nail-biting, the dramatic scenes credible but unremarkable. Worse, the comedy feels less than edgy, which is perplexing given that the script was penned by veteran comedy team Sam Bain (The Thick of It) and Jesse Armstrong (Four Lions), jointly responsible for Peep Show and Fresh Meat, both exquisite studies in social humiliation. Perhaps because Babylon’s world is more serious and ‘realistic’, its characters feel a little bland, with the exception of loose-cannon rookie cop Robbie, exuberantly played by Adam Deacon. Unfortunately, his antics are so over-the-top that they clash with the rest of the show’s muted tone.

Bain’s excoriating political satire The Thick of It gave us comic masterpiece Malcolm Tucker, party whip and arguably the most creative swearer in the history of television (‘I’m going to take your bollocks, I’m going to fucking rip them off, I’m going to fucking paint eyeballs on them, I’m going to stitch them to a fucking sock and use that for our fucking mouthpiece.’)  Babylon’s characters awkwardly bantering over the origin of the insult ‘scrote’ can’t help but feel tame in comparison.

Indeed, its best moments recall The Thick of It, and Babylon is strongest when portraying institutional power plays, buck-passing and general incompetence; the hazy relationship between the official version of the truth versus actual facts (‘That’s what everyone says, but no one’s said it, but apparently they know … Everyone knows but no one will actually say it, so we can’t say it’); and the authorities’ futile attempts to control the flow of information in a world of instant communication and omnipresent camera phones.

Perhaps the real problem with this show is simply that television itself is mutating so rapidly. Five years ago, Babylon might have seemed sharp and inventive, but since then we’ve had Black Mirror. Written by Charlie Brooker, this dystopian sci-fi satire depicted a recognisable Britain of the very near future, taking the modern technological obsession and death of privacy to its logical extreme. The plotline of its very first episode had the prime minister agonising over whether to grant a kidnapper’s demand for him to have intercourse with a pig on live TV, while his aides tracked the consequences for his popularity on social media. After that, the bar for black comedy was permanently raised.

Boyle, Bain and Armstrong have all had long, prolific careers, so it’s perhaps unsurprising that their style is becoming a little tired and familiar. But this is not to say that their expiration date has yet passed. Babylon’s pilot lays the ground for a competent police procedural with some mildly clever satire. It’s an entertaining enough hour of television, which might hit its stride once the series gets underway. Fans of Danny Boyle can only cross their fingers and hope.

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Babylon

Created by: Danny Boyle, Robert Jones, Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain
Written by: Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain
Directed by: Danny Boyle
Starring: James Nesbitt, Brit Marling, Paterson Joseph, Jonny Sweet, Bertie Carvel, Ella Smith, Martin Trenaman, Jim Howick, Jill Halfenny, Adam Deacon, Cavan Clerkin, Andrew Brooke, Nick Blood, Stuart Martin, Daniel Kaluuya
Theme music composed by: Rick Smith
Executive Producers: Robert Jones, Jesse Armstrong, Sam Bain
Producer: Derrin Schlesinger
Editor: Jon Harris
Production Company: Nightjack Ltd

Melbourne International Film Festival
www.miff.com.au   
31 July – 17 August