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Los Angeles Theatre
“This is the most magical place in the world.”
Jack Conrad (Brad Pitt)
A true declaration of love to the cinema, Babylon had to exploit one of the most mythical projection rooms in Hollywood. This is how several sequences take place. Damien Chazelle shot the scene in front of the theater in which Nellie LaRoy (Margot Robbie) presents her film to an enthusiastic crowd. The final sequence, with Manny Torres (Diego Calva) crying in front of a screen where he thinks he can see his entire career in Hollywood, also takes place in the main room of this temple of the seventh art.
Once upon a time, there was silent cinema
It is impossible for the Los Angeles Theatre to go unnoticed with its spectacular facade and its interior inspired by the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles. A real monument that Damien Chazelle used, even if it means to voluntarily ignore that in reality, the cinema was not yet completed at the time when Babylon takes place. The cinema makes its comeback in the last act of the film, when Manny Torres (Diego Calva) returns to Los Angeles and reminisces about his younger days.
A true revelation
If Margot Robbie and Brad Pitt shine in Babylon, the real revelation of the film is Diego Calva. The actor having returned on his experience in the columns of the site Ciné Série: “With Margot Robbie, I had the best possible acting experience. I had never worked with someone so disciplined, invested and crazy. Margot Robbie is literally the greatest actress I know. I will always be grateful to her because my scenes with her are the best in my career. With Brad Pitt, it was different because I was constantly trying to “steal” things from him. I wanted to learn from him. He is like a catcher in baseball. He is very wise and controls his art.“
Composer Justin Hurwitz has scored all five of Damien Chazelle’s films. In 2022, he had never composed for another director.
Los Angeles Theatre
More than a cinema, the Los Angeles Theater is a true historical monument of the city of angels.
With a capacity of 2,000 seats, this cinema was built in 1931 by HL Gumbiner, a personality in the Chicago entertainment industry. With its architecture inspired by the French Baroque movement, it has an interior modeled on the Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles. Wishing to premiere his film City Lights there, Charlie Chaplin helped finance the work so that the cinema was completed on time. The Los Angeles Theater has often been used as a filming location for films like New York, New York and Charlie’s Angels. He also features in the music videos for Taylor Swift’s Delicate and Aerosmith’s Jaded.
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Cult! movies: 100 mythical places of cinema [French Edition]
Since the dawn of cinema, films have invaded the world and highlighted sometimes unexpected places. Every film location has its secrets. The latter are sometimes as exciting as the feature films themselves.
Did you know that the cemetery where the final duel of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly was built from scratch and that no body lies there? Or that the bus ofInto The Wild has been moved to discourage fans from spending the night there? From the story of the construction of The Bridge on the River Kwai to the incredible encounter during the shooting of the last scene ofIndiana Jones and the Last Crusadeembark on an exciting world tour with the greatest stars of the seventh art. Shiver in the real haunted house ofAmityville and discover the terrifying anecdotes of the making ofApocalypse Now in the Philippines. Visit the building of Blade Runner before stopping at Hogwarts and finally landing in Jurassic Parkin the middle of the Hawaiian archipelago. What if we also took you behind the scenes of the making of the Hobbits’ village of Lord of the Rings ?
Produced by a team of pop-culture specialists and enhanced by numerous anecdotes, Cult! movies tells the secrets of the places that made the history of cinema.
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Discover all the places Babylon on our map
By Gilles Rolland
Passionné de cinéma, de rock and roll, de séries TV et de littérature. Rédacteur de presse et auteur des livres Le Heavy Metal au cinéma, Paroles de fans Guns N' Roses, Paroles de fans Rammstein et Welcome to my Jungle : 100 albums rock et autres anecdotes dépareillées. Adore également voyager à la recherche des lieux les plus emblématiques de la pop culture.