ManiakJiggy
This is How Movies Should Be Made
Bob
This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.
samgreco21
Is drama not a necessity in modern cinema anymore. And says who? The new breed of directors? Ones who cannot create drama. o.K. Film is the evolution of a tradition of storytelling that has been going on since there was man. From the caveman stories. Later there where Greek plays by Sophocles, Euripedes and onto Shakespeare. Drama servers a purpose and its form follows narration. The number one rule in drama is: Don't bore the audience. David Mammet said this, but I am sure Shakespeare and all the ancient Greek playwrights would agree. Afer all they had to perform in front of a live audience who judged them daily. Back then there were no festival darlings with stuffy professors calling this or that better art. You were judged by the common man sitting in the audience. Great photography and mood does not drama make. Many of the trivial banalities (dialog and activities) reminded me of reality TV material. With better photography, sound and actors of course. Can't find another movie by this director in the last 6 years so maybe this film cost him.
Claudio Carvalho
In Paris, the Chinese student of cinema Song Fang (Song Fang) is hired to work as the nanny of Simon (Simon Iteanu) by his divorced mother Suzanne (Juliette Binoche) that works dubbing marionettes in a theater. Suzanne is having troubles with her tenant Marc (Hyppolyte Girarddot) that does not pay the rent while she waits for the return of her older daughter Louise (Louise Margolin) that lives with her father in Brussels."Le Voyage du Ballon Rouge" is a pointless and boring movie about the quotidian life of a woman that dubs marionettes and lives alone with her beloved son. I cannot understand the hype surrounding this disappointing movie that goes nowhere, where the greatest excitement is when the workers move the piano to the upper floor and the greatest curiosity for those that have never played piano is when the technician tunes up the same piano. The pretentious director Hsiao-hsien Hou includes a red balloon to give the appearance of cult-movie to this forgettable flick that wastes the talented Juliette Binoche in a dull story. My vote is five.Title (Brazil): "A Viagem do Balão Vermelho" ("The Voyage of the Red Balloon")
cosmin-pasnicu
At first I was surprised to see such a negative first review. After looking through the other comments I understood why. There is no middle impression on this movie. It's one of those movies that you love or hate/dislike. It's not a "good" or "not bad" movie.I just think it touched some people, like me. I spent 1 1/2 years in Paris and I have a profound passion for French culture since I was a kid. For me, after living for more than 5 months in China, it felt good to remember Paris. I saw a movie that depicted only a snapshot of some people's lives. Their way of living, their problems are typical to the French society.One user was talking about plot, drama. For me, this movie was more about feelings than actions. Some smiles, some tears, the image, the people. It made me remember "Paris, je t'aime".I think that if I didn't have the Paris experience or an affinity for the French society, the movie wouldn't have touched so much. I think there's a second level in this movie that is accessible only to those who understand the French society.
gradyharp
Somewhere the highly regarded Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-Hsien had the idea of paying homage to the 1956 classic Albert Lamorisse film THE RED BALLOON, a tender story of a child's interaction with a nearly animate floating balloon, and while there is indeed an short introduction of a small boy addressing an errant red balloon floating in Paris, the 'homage' stops there. What follows is an overly long, frustratingly impromptu series of scenes that lack cohesion and resolution. THE FLIGHT OF THE RED BALLOON (Le Voyage du balloon rouge) is a prolonged (113 minutes) series of scenes that stutter along with the same sort of wandering course of the occasionally visible red balloon to present moments in the life of a disheveled, frumpy, single mother Suzanne (Juliette Binoche) whose income depends on her fascination and obsession with Chinese marionette presentations for which she supplies the backstage voice for all of the characters. Her absent 'husband/boyfriend' has left her to write in Montreal while Suzanne must care for her young son Simon (Simon Iteanu) with the help of a newly hired Taiwanese photographer nanny Song (Fang Song) while her daughter resides in Brussels. This disheveled household is further complicated by the freeloading Marc (Hippolyte Girardot), the friend of her absentee 'husband', by Simon's piano lessons taught by Anna (Anna Sigalevitch), and by impossible conflicting schedules for marionette performances, partially relieved by Song's quiet ability to take Simon on adventures outside the confines of the cluttered little space they all call home. The only quieting element of this film is the occasional appearance of the 'guardian angel' red balloon, which seems to be a symbol for defining the real world of Simon and the illusory world he craves. The dialogue as written by Hou and François Margolin is choppy and the camera work and constant meandering piano music seem extemporaneous: there are few resolutions to the individual stories that are only hinted. Juliette Binoche is a solid actress able to make the most of a minimal script and horrendous costuming and makeup: her moments of being the voice of marionettes are magical. But this Red Balloon just doesn't take flight in the context of this homage. As with the rest of the film the balloon just floats off at the end. The viewer needs a lot of patience with this film! Grady Harp
