Slightly different from our usual audio/visual non narrative films HPM reviews, Babies actually follows four humans during their first few months of birth. We see them come into the world and observe little triumphs and dramas of their daily lives.
Babies works on several different levels. The first is purely for baby lovers – these children are adorable and their faces light up the screen as they figure out the puzzling world around them. Secondly we have four Babies from across the globe – Japan, USA, Namibia & Mongolia. Each territory has their own traditions and its fascinating seeing each child get washed and cleaned. We may showers, others may just be licked! Thirdly – how similar we all are despite all the different things we do. It’s never really alluded to but you can see its a message behind all the smiles and tears.
Holding the images together is a faint score that quietly bumbles away and adds to the senses of awareness, cuteness and general new life. I guess the closest we have to a film like this already on the site is Microcosmos – only this is just observations, not putting things directly in time to music.
Now we have Babies – I personally would love the same concept but with toddlers! As soon as they get into more mischief it’ll be more entertaining fun!