Babies

‘Babies cry across the world for hunger and attentionand in every society, mothers answer their call. That just about sums up themessage and meaning of Thomas Balmes’ documentary, Babies. The French director collects his closely observed footageon the earliest life of children from four widely separate sites, remotevillages in Namibia and Mongolia along with cosmopolitan centers in Tokyo and San Francisco.

The Namibian cluster of stick and grass huts, far inthe desert of southwest Africa, looksuntouched by recent technology. The Mongolian family lives in a yurt with asatellite dish and an electric generator; their baby is born in a hospital andwrapped tightly by the nurse in swaddling clothes, following an ancient andwidespread nativity custom. The hospital and home environments in Tokyo and Frisco arefamiliar and comfortably middle class.

The anthropological comparisons are interesting,especially the ways in which children are socialized in different cultures. Themovie is beautifully filmed and virtually wordless except for the cooingchatter of parents. Given its presentation, it’s impossible not to think of Babies as a wildlife documentary withhuman children as the species under observation.

Babies isscreening at the Downer Theatre.