Now that all 3 films to the unofficial trilogy are out, how would you list them in order of preference?
1. Amores Perros (9/10 and my no. 7 of 2001)
2. Babel (8/10 my no. 5, so far, of 2006)
3. 21 Grams (6/10)
So, you say you don't like his work because "his character are largely sterotyped", and yet the thing you hate the most is that he is trying to show that "there is more to African than kids with guns" or "Japanese are not always perverted people"?
So if I understand correctly, you dislike that he shows stereotypes, and hates that he tries to break down these stereotypes and show that there is more to these people than we gather from such a stereotype?
I guess everyone is entitled to their opinion, but that doesn't seem like a bad thing to display in a movie.
I love that Innarritu's films do just that: they teach understanding. A lot of his film's show characters that do despicable things, yet we learn to see them as a whole person and sympathize with them.
I also love that he poses a lot of moral questions... Babel is all about miscommunication and misunderstandings. Amores Perros (like another poster pointed out) shows how our initial impressions of someone can be very non-representative of the person's true nature. And 21 Grams... I'd have to see it again, but I found it to be the least thematic and cohesive of the three. I admired it, but I need to give it another watch.