The White Balloon

Jafar Panaki, Iran 1995, 85 minutes

The countdown to the New Year has started. A five-year-old girl is asked by her mother to catch a goldfish in a bowl to decorate the house for the coming festivities... but the goldfish swimming in their pond are so small, and the ones in the market are so plump and beautiful, with fins like delicate veils! Determined to buy a fish from the market, she promises her brother her white balloon if he helps her get the money she needs. This is only the first stage of her odyssey through the winding streets of the city in search of her ideal goldfish. On her arduous journey (which takes her from catastrophe to catastrophe) she meets all sorts of different people.

The story is so laughably simple that you'd need a lot of talent and a powerful imagination to make something worthwhile out of it, and The White Balloon is the proof that Iranian director Jafar Panaki has got it! He turns this banal story into a riveting spectacle, close to an epic, with the young girl transformed into a heroine resolutely fighting against fate and foes to win her prize; a prize which we despair of her ever getting right until the end. The young girl gives an impressive performance, with uniquely genuine facial expressions that could sometimes make your heart break, especially when she sulks by the fish pond, disappointed by her mother's refusal to give her money.

Seriously now, how often will you get the chance of watching an Iranian film? And a good one at that. If it will help convince you, it won a "Palme" at the Cannes Film Festival, but trust me, you'll like it.

"Among a crowd of wham-bam, multi-million-dollar gut-crunchers, The White Balloon stands tall as, possibly, the most real film of the year. ****" - Empire

Review by Katia Saint-Peron
Taken from EUFS Programme 1996-97