The most surprising thing about Albert Lamorisse's 1956
The Red
Balloon (Le ballon rouge) is that it hasn't been available on
quality home video until now. Many who attended grade school in the
1960s will remember being shown this classic in scratchy 16mm prints;
only now can it be appreciated in its original, beautiful colors. Kids
love the nonverbal story and adults will be mesmerized by the beautiful
views of Paris circa 1956. Janus Films' new DVD replicates the clarity
of the original, in beautiful Technicolor hues.
The film often circulated in schools as an aid for creative writing,
but ended up being shown primarily for entertainment. The simple,
inspirational story encourages adults to look for symbols and
metaphors. Many viewers that wouldn't blink twice at a foreign art film
accepted
The Red Balloon as a work of cinema genius.
The Red Balloon is the kind of soap bubble movie that doesn't
sound like much when described, but grows in the imagination after a
single viewing. A hillside neighborhood in Paris is established in
beautiful views that avoid bright colors. Francophiles will marvel at
time-machine images of wet cobble-stoned streets at dawn, painted in
rich darkness. We see a boy on his way to school pause, and then climb
a light post for an unknown purpose ... until the camera tilts to
reveal a bright red balloon caught above. From this point forward, the
film becomes a series of low-key adventures. Trolleys don't permit
balloons, so the boy must run to school. A janitor holds the balloon
for the boy while he's in class. When his mother throws the balloon out
a window, the fantasy begins in earnest. Instead of drifting away, the
balloon waits for the boy to open the window and let it back in. The
balloon follows the boy to school, plays hide-and-seek with him,
etc.
The film's surface is formalized just enough to suggest a color
children's book of the kind that became popular in the 1950s. The
camera maintains a medium distance most of the time, adding to the
impression of a 2D concept come to life in a 3D Parisian environment.
The balloon is simple in conception, just a red orb that instantly
attracts the eye. It never behaves in an openly cartoonish manner, even
though it tags along with the kid and tries to entertain him. The kid
accepts his new companion at face value, and they're soon
inseparable.
The Red Balloon shares a general dramatic structure with
Lamorisse's earlier
White Mane, a story of a boy and a horse.
Both boys form unusual independent relationships that are threatened by
unsympathetic outsiders. The balloon easily evades parents and
schoolmasters but can't escape a pack of schoolboys armed with stones
and slingshots. As with the cowboys in
White Mane, the
youngsters want to destroy the red balloon simply because it's
different, or because it defies them. The somewhat alarming finale is a
whimsical miracle that suggests that the only antidote for cruel
reality is a fantasy escape.
The Red Balloon was a big hit in America, thanks to the many
copies distributed to classrooms. It was for many American children
their first exposure to a European Art film. Post- screening
discussions would invariably begin with the teacher's assertion that
the balloon is a symbol. Lamorisse's myth-in-miniature attracts
interpretations like an inkblot, and more often than not a high
schooler would bring up the idea that the movie's death-and-rebirth
theme reminded them of the story of Christ. As with the boy-horse
relationship in
White Mane, the boy's relationship with the
balloon puts him at odds with society at large. Others don't recognize
the wonder of the magical balloon, and instinctively seek to possess or
destroy it.
Most important to
The Red Balloon's enduring appeal is the fact
that it
doesn't insist on a particular point of view.
Jirí Trnka's animated short subject
The Hand (Ruka) was
also shown in many classrooms in the 1960s, but it was obviously chosen
for its anti-Communist message.
The Red Balloon remains as light
and airy ... as a balloon. Its most amusing passage occurs at a
sidewalk flea market. While the balloon admires itself in a mirror (!),
the boy regards a painting of a small girl. He then encounters a
living, breathing kindergarten-age beauty, also carrying a balloon, a
blue one. The balloons show a definite affinity for each other, but the
boy isn't yet ready to trifle with the opposite sex. Boy and girl go
their own way. Is the girl's balloon also magic? We're not
sure.
Janus Film's DVD of
The Red Balloon (Le ballon rouge) is a
beautiful flat transfer of a film originally released in Technicolor.
It looks much better than the spliced (and edited?) 16mm prints from
long ago. Maurice Le Roux's gentle score sounds fine and the few words
of French dialogue are translated in a removable set of English
subtitles. Critic Michael Koresky provides liner notes, stressing the
fact that the film won a Best Original Screenplay Oscar in 1957 ...
despite being an almost completely visual concept that barely needed a
formal script. Its competition that year was
The Bold and the Brave,
Julie, The Ladykillers and
La strada.
This was Albert Lamorisse's biggest success, He made a feature
semi-sequel in 1960, called
Le voyage en ballon. In it, a
slightly older Pascal flies over France in his grandfather's full-sized
balloon. A dubbed American version
Stowaway in the Sky was
reportedly marred by an intrusive narration read by actor Jack Lemmon.
In 2007 director Hsiao - hsien Hou an homage to the Lamorisse original,
Le voyage du ballon rouge starring Juliette Binoche.
For more information about
The Red Balloon (Special Edition),
visit
The Criterion
Collection. To order
The Red Balloon, go to
TCM Shopping
by Glenn Erickson
