What
appears to be an homage to Albert Lamorisse’s 1956 short
children’s film, The Red Balloon, turns out to
be a pretentious arty non-event. The original The Red Balloon
was a bittersweet study of a boy followed by his miraculous pet
balloon through Paris streets, with his balloon ultimately destroyed
by bullies. It’s director Hou Hsiao-hsien’s conceit
that he can make a 113-minute feature from such material that
was just right in a 30-minute format. While the new film opens
attractively – a series of similar shots to the original
with an appealing tousle headed child and cleverly manipulated
balloon – it meanders into a dreary family saga in which
the most exciting moments are a dispute with the downstairs tenant
and shifting a piano.
Seven year-old Simon (Simon Itaneau) meets his new
nanny, a Chinese film student Song (Fang Song) who seems hooked
on The Red Balloon. They wander Paris streets and parks with –
guess what – a huge red balloon floating above them, seemingly
following them around as if by magic. We go to their cluttered
apartment where Simon’s rather lonely mother Suzanne (Juliette
Binoche) argues with a nutcase downstairs, and has a husband living
in Canada. He probably was bored to death.
Major events in the domestic situation include moving
a piano upstairs then having it tuned, a confabulation over a
neighbour’s cooking, and similar Earth-shattering issues.
The dialogue is improvised, repetitious and in real-time. It’s
true slice of life, (‘kitchen sink’ we used to call
it) but without a driving plot. Even those adolescent reality
TV shows (which are a contrived slice of life) have a plot of
sorts. The always-attractive (though here looking frazzled) Juliette
Binoche (Paris, je t’aime) does surprisingly well with improvisation,
leading to an adroitly filmed puppet show, though her astonishing
vocal routine might frighten birds out of tress.
Drama
is supposed to be life with the boring bits cut out. In this case,
the director left them all in. However Alfred Hitchcock (I think)
once said – there is not a film from which you can’t
take away some good. Here it’s the last scene with a group
of children at the Musee d’Orsay discussing the meaning
of a painting of a child chasing a red ball, and also the commendable
piano soundtrack. It’s hard to be critical of the acting,
since a great deal of dialogue is ad-libbed – not an easy
feat, especially for the child. The cast comes over as real people,
which is great, yet lacking serious development in their lives
to glue the whole thing together.
There are some impressive scenes with the balloon
as mentioned, although the colour has a compressed contrast range
and appears a little flat, lacking real sparkle in highlights.
Because in many ways the short 1956 film was more effective, this
‘homage’ falls on its own sword. It’s certainly
art-house material and will no doubt gain some enthusiastic viewers
who can accept such a minimalistic approach to the story.
Sincere apologies if I’ve offended fans of
Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-hsien (Café Lumiere)
– he’s highly regarded in festivals with his pedestrian
visions of alienation and loneliness. But while Flight of
the Red Balloon may not be the most boring film I’ve
ever seen, at this moment I can’t think of one to beat it.
Sadly, it’s a poetic essay with a hollow core.
What
appears to be an homage to Albert Lamorisse’s 1956 short
children’s film, The Red Balloon, turns out to
be a pretentious arty non-event. The original The Red Balloon
was a bittersweet study of a boy followed by his miraculous pet
balloon through Paris streets, with his balloon ultimately destroyed
by bullies. It’s director Hou Hsiao-hsien’s conceit
that he can make a 113-minute feature from such material that
was just right in a 30-minute format. While the new film opens
attractively – a series of similar shots to the original
with an appealing tousle headed child and cleverly manipulated
balloon – it meanders into a dreary family saga in which
the most exciting moments are a dispute with the downstairs tenant
and shifting a piano. 
Drama
is supposed to be life with the boring bits cut out. In this case,
the director left them all in. However Alfred Hitchcock (I think)
once said – there is not a film from which you can’t
take away some good. Here it’s the last scene with a group
of children at the Musee d’Orsay discussing the meaning
of a painting of a child chasing a red ball, and also the commendable
piano soundtrack. It’s hard to be critical of the acting,
since a great deal of dialogue is ad-libbed – not an easy
feat, especially for the child. The cast comes over as real people,
which is great, yet lacking serious development in their lives
to glue the whole thing together.