Through a bank of secretive clouds, you begin to glimpse an uncannily familiar image. Wisps dance before your vision, but slowly the picture becomes clear. Bruegel the Elder’s iconic Tower of Babel is staring at you from a hundred of its arched windows, as a choir of voices lifts to an ear-splitting crescendo. The painting is not all it seems; here and there you can see movement as the original figures have been animated to twitch like ants in their minuscule velocity. This is not Babylon, this is BABELDOM: a self-destructive city of tomorrow.

Paul Bush has attempted the impossible: a “documentary about the future.” I went to the Cambridge Arts Picturehouse screening of his first feature length film, followed by a Q&A with the man behind The City. A short film veteran, Bush has been directing short and ‘medium’ length films since the 80s: a film of six minutes is a bit of an opus in the context of his other works. Bush explained that with his short pieces he aims to place an idea in the viewer’s head as quickly as possible, whereas a feature film allows for a dialectic. Bush likes to bounce ideas off his audience.

Too many ideas have spoilt the cold, stomach-leadening broth of BABELDOM.

Herein lies BABELDOM’s greatest flaw: erraticism. Too many ideas have spoilt the cold, stomach-leadening broth of BABELDOM. The premise of a city which seems to devour sunlight, creeping perennially upwards to seek more rays whilst darkening the districts below is an intriguing comment on the modern urban world. Layering this sketch with a vague notion of time travel or lost time, and sudden satirical elements on linguistics and the simulated pleasures on offer at Babeldom, it’s difficult to see the structure of the metropolis, let alone the original foundations of Bush’s fictional muse.

Talking of muses, the femme misérable of BABELDOM is actress Youla Boudali. She and Mark Caven deliver monologues over shots of semi-familiar cities which represent the urban behemoth of the future. As escalators concertina in close-up and fountains spit in brassy interiors, the actors philosophise over the enigmatic city and their inability to connect with one another. They are a Romeo and Juliet of time and space: he is stuck in the guts of BABELDOM while she tries to find meaning in antiquities at the British Museum, in the present day. Bush decided to have two voices rather than a single commentator so there would be some kind of interaction. Boudali’s lilting, unidentifiable accent against co-star Mark Caven’s American drawl are fitting, after all: “someone from the future couldn’t have an English accent.”

…“math” has transformed the theoretical constrictions of reality…

In order to render his work more futuristic, Bush sourced scientific computer generated footage from universities and institutions all over the world. With one of the central tenets of the Babeldom universe being that “math” has transformed the theoretical constrictions of reality, images of molecular modelling and imitations of natural phenomena through algorithms seem appropriate. However, as one audience member pointed out, the fact that these are scientific ‘films’ very much of the present anchors Babeldom in the “now” rather than an unforeseen future. With over half of the film made up from borrowed computer imagery, it’s hard to avoid the impression that this reliance on alternative sources was less a result of ingenious experimentation than a paucity of original footage.

One major negative comment on Babeldom has been that it was “too pessimistic.” When I broached Bush with this view, he seemed at first confused by such a critical response, but then asked, “compared to what?” and pointed out that his work contains many satirical elements. He was also quick to remind me of one particular segment in the film containing computer generated naked women, and joked that the scientists involved were so distracted by working out the correct algorithm for breast movement that they got the hair completely wrong (a mutually disappointing exchange: Bush hoping to deflect and failing to embarrass me). Although the lighter elements of the film are to be commended, they fail to complement the greater ménage of nihilistic tones.

The exceptional sound engineering can’t be ignored in BABELDOM. The ‘Babeldom Choir’ forms a choral backdrop which provides a pulse to the lifeless proceedings. With almost no real humans captured on screen at all, the disembodied voices are rendered all the more powerful by the implication that they stand in for the subjugated citizens of the future. One particularly memorable piece, ‘Curse upon Iron,’ is a haunting Estonian work, evoking a kind of frenzied and horrific beauty which Babeldom itself is supposed to embody.

Taking seven years from original concept to full feature film, it’s a shame that BABELDOM is such a disappointment. Bush funded the film itself, and it’s a brave attempt. However, it seems he’s more adept at playing with a single, short-lived idea than spinning several at once. It’s fitting that Babeldom is more thought-provoking in hindsight, as though you have to travel in time yourself to fully appreciate it. I don’t wish to visit Babeldom again though. Sometimes, even a city needs charisma.

httpvh://vimeo.com/25123392