The classic romance of a Parisian boy and his huge red balloon returns with the same director's equally honoured White Mane, the tale of a country boy's passion for a beautiful wild horse.
Screened as part of NZIFF 2008
The Red Balloon/White Mane
"If you're of a certain age, chances are one of your seminal childhood moviegoing experiences was Albert Lamorisse's lovely The Red Balloon about a Parisian boy's friendship with a red balloon so iridescent that I incorrectly remembered the rest of the film as black-and-white. Now you can take your kids and/or yourself to see a gorgeously restored new print... released with Lamorisse's 1953 White Mane, an exquisite story of a similarly angelic lad and his horse-pal resisting capture on the shallow white plains of the Camargue. For all the seraphic beauty of the boys, neither movie resorts more than briefly to cuteness; both are escape fantasies that pay homage to the inventiveness of children." — Ella Taylor, Village Voice.
"The stories are simple, fablelike; the heroes are boys; the subject in each case is the purity and power of a child's imagination; and the tone of both films is that of open-mouthed wonder." — Terence Rafferty, NY Times