67: The White Balloon (a.k.a. Badkonake Sefid – Original Persian title)

            I am consistently baffled by Iranian films.  I don’t dislike the so-called “Iranian new wave”, but I’m still not quite sure that I understand what this movement – if it actually is one – stands for.  It has the makings of other great film renaissances: consistent moods and structures, key players, and one emerged “great artist”.  Abbas Kiarostami has been at the forefront of the Iranian film industry for two decades now, and has become the godfather of this emerging artistic sect.  He’s directed many of the new wave’s seminal pictures, including The Wind Will Carry Us (1999; #70) and Taste of Cherry (1996), and shows up in former assistant Jafar Panahi’s The White Balloon (1995), sharing a screenplay credit with the director.

              Like most of Kiarostami’s stories, The White Balloon has a simple premise.  Seven year old Razieh wants a new fat goldfish for her family to help celebrate the Iranian New Year.  It’s the only present she really wants because it “looks like it’s dancing when it swims.”  Razieh and her older brother finally convince their mother to let them buy one.  She gives Razieh the family’s last 500 rial note with strict instructions only to spend one hundred.  On the way to the fish shop Razieh losses the note to swindlers, recovers it, and then losses it again.  When she finds that the money has fallen below a basement ventilation grate, she doesn’t know what to do.  Tethered to the money by the prospect of it being reached by others, she is stuck in the streets of Tehran.  Eventually her brother comes to find her and the two children are forced to rely on strangers for help to retrieve the note. 

            This film has a strong thematic relation to Bicycle Thieves (1948), but not nearly the emotional pull, particularly after Razieh’s whining about the fish becomes annoying.  Where the movie does succeed is in its ability to convey the confusing nature of the world through the eyes of a child.  Razieh has a conversation with a soldier who asks her if she’s been told not to talk to strangers.  She can’t reply without breaking the rule.  She knows that she isn’t supposed to, but she can’t turn down offers for help, even if she is suspicious of the offer.

             Panahi and Kiarostami were right in keeping this material short.  At 85 minutes this story doesn’t have time to overreach.  The 1001 text alludes to some greater social meanings, but being unfamiliar with Iranian norms of the mid 1990s, I’ll refrain from any speculation.  Still, I suppose the befuddlement I mentioned before comes from wondering what it all could mean.  

Curiously, most of the information online about the film notes that the story takes place in real time, counting down to the Persian New Year, Nowrūz.*  Even an initial viewing of the film yields this untrue, as it is plainly stated at the outset that the New Year is over an hour and half away.  Though this isn’t the most engaging material, it could serve that small niche of introducing older children to the world of Middle Eastern cinema.

Language: Persian

Runtime: 85 Minutes

Available @Youtube.com

Grade: 2 Hats Off

* Nowrūz is the celebration of spring at the Vernal Equinox and therefore happens at midday.  This may confuse viewers wondering why this countdown to the New Year takes place in daylight.