There’s nothing as disarming as a baby’s smile — you see them breaking people’s tough exteriors all the time. So it should make people happy to know there is a whole documentary about babies, called Babies. But there is more than just a lot of gurgles and nappies going on.
Babies looks at the first year of four children: Ponijao, a girl born in Namibia; Bayar, a boy on a Mongolia farm; Mari, a girl from Japan; and Hattie, from San Francisco in the US.
The documentary looks at the critical early stages of each child’s life. We witness their first words, their inquisitive steps and exploration, the triumphant struggles to walk and then run. It sounds cute and mundane, but it is anything but.
The images are brought wordlessly by French director Thomas Balmes. There is no commentary, some music, and the parents are often decorating the scene, not babbling about baby to camera. And each scene is not just shot; it is crafted, and the imagery is quite elegantly composed without being too self-conscious or using any tricks or effects.
And despite the silence, there is so much being said. Hattie lies there as her mother runs an adhesive brush over her to remove any dust; Ponijao picks up a bone from the dust and sucks on it. She is crawling through the stuff!
We see the different methods they take to wash the baby, from showers to tubs to using a mother’s tongue. While the Mongolian boy takes a bath, a goat casually walks up and takes a drink from it. The kid didn’t blink even when a rooster walked all over his bed — while he was lying in it.
And there’s lots of humour. In Mongolia, Bayar, is pushed in his pram by his tormenting brother right into the middle of the cattle — and left there. And when the American parents sing songs to the Earth Mother and wave their hands, Hattie heads for the door and pulls on the handle, just as I felt like doing the same.
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