'Babies' director observes documentary from unique viewpoint
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Ponijao, who lives in Namibia with her family, is one of four babies followed from birth to first steps in Thomas Balmès' "Babies."
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After the release of documentaries with a razor-sharp point of view ("Capitalism," "The Cove") or star narrator ("March of the Penguins," "Oceans"), it's easy to see why moviegoers believe such films should be informative or inflammatory. Or both.
But Frenchman Thomas Balmes, director of "Babies," has a different take on docs.
He chronicles four children -- Ponijao in Namibia, Bayar in Mongolia, Mari in Tokyo and Hattie in San Francisco -- from infancy to first steps. His 80-minute movie, opening today at the Manor Theater, has no narrator or subtitles for the sparse dialogue.
Mr. Balmes says it can allow people to realize a documentary can be funny, feel-good and entertaining "but using exactly what is the real definition of documentary, which, to me, is pure observation."
The director spent two years amassing 400 hours of film. He shot about 80 percent himself (often alone or with only a translator nearby), taking care to present almost a baby's-eye view of the world, a strategy enhanced by music and lack of a voice-over, interviews and formal dialogue.
"I had a very specific tripod," he said in heavily accented English in a recent call. "Everything is on the level of babies and I've been almost cutting every head of the adults. You very rarely have them in the picture, you very rarely hear them speaking and even the music [by Bruno Coulais] ... created a kind of special language."
Mr. Balmes, whose films have examined peacekeepers in Bosnia, the mad-cow crisis from the Indian perspective and the conversion to Christianity of a Papuan chief, made it clear to the parents that he would not be a baby sitter.
But he didn't need to be, either.
"Even if you don't see them in the frame, they are never far away," he said of the parents, and they're always looking after the children and would have jumped in, if real danger arose.
Besides, he says, "How different it can be from one country to another, the kind of confidence the parents in some of the countries have in their kids to know what to do and what not to do."
The documentary maker never planned to be judgmental, steering the audience toward what is good or bad. His goal: "As much as possible, leave the viewer to make his own comment and make his own conclusion."
First Published May 7, 2010 12:00 am
