After having its world premiere in Cannes in 1980, the film “Babylon” is set to premiere for the first time in the United States in South Florida at the O Cinema Miami Beach! In partnership with Third Horizon Film Festival, you’ll be able to watch the film from April 12th-April 19th on selected times! For all the info needed to get tickets and on the movie, click HERE.
Photo: “Babylon” trailer
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Never-before released in North America, Franco Rosso’s incendiary BABYLON had its world premiere at Cannes in 1980 but went unreleased in the U.S. for “being too controversial, and likely to incite racial tension”. BABYLON comes to South Florida exclusively at O Cinema Miami Beach, presented in partnership with Third Horizon Film Festival.
POST FILM CONVERSATION – April 12th
A conversation following the film between Third Horizon creative director Keisha Rae Witherspoon and Dr. Pat Saunders of the University of Miami on the legacy of the film and its place in the canon of Caribbean cinema will take place on Friday, April 12th immediately after the 8:30pm screening.
THIRD HORIZON CLOSING NIGHT – April 19th
Join us on Friday, April 19th for a special closing night screening of BABYLON. It’s 4/20 eve and we’ll be kicking off the weekend with a DJ set by WRD SOUND PWR before the screening courtesy of the night’s co-host KGN, Miami-based curators of Caribbean cool.
Raw and smoldering, it follows a young dancehall DJ (Brinsley Forde, frontman of landmark British reggae group Aswad) in South London as he pursues his musical ambitions, battling fiercely against the racism and xenophobia of employers, neighbors, police, and the National Front. Written by Martin Stellman (Quadrophenia) and shot by two-time Oscar® winner Chris Menges (The Killing Fields) with beautifully smoky cinematography that has been compared to Taxi Driver, BABYLON is fearless and unsentimental, yet tempered by the hazy bliss of the dancehall set to a blistering reggae and lovers rock soundtrack featuring Aswad, Johnny Clarke, Dennis Bovell, and more.
You’ve seen The Harder They Come, maybe you’ve seen Rockers, but you’ve never seen anything like BABYLON.
“Like the reggae music that pulses through it, Babylon is rich, rough and real. And like the streetlife of the young black Londoners it portrays, it’s threatening, touching, violent and funny. This one seems to explode in the gut with a powerful mix of pain and pleasure.”
– VARIETY
“An English cousin to the earlier Jamaica-set films ‘The Harder They Come’ and ‘Rockers’ that is vastly superior in cinematic terms and just as valuable as a cultural document.”
– HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
“All of that observation in Babylon amounts to something that still feels new. You’re looking at people who, in 1980 England, were, at last, being properly, seriously seen.”
– NEW YORK TIMES
“The cast’s rumble and spark are draw enough, but there’s also Chris Menges’ textured urban cinematography and Rosso’s empathetic direction, like neorealism rewired and amplified.”
– LOS ANGELES TIMES
“Babylon brims over with life in ways that few films of recent vintage could manage, a movie-moment that remembers when “One Love” was enough to end any argument and calm any troubled waters.”
– MOVIE NATION
