(2010) Four babies, three girls and a boy - Ponijao in Namibia, Mari in Japan, Hattie in San Francisco, and Bayarjargal in Mongolia - are filmed for a year (each receiving about 20 minutes of on-camera attention) in Thomas Balmès's documentary, giving birth to Alain Chabati's conception, of infancy across the globe.

Alternating from one culture to the next with no narration and limited dialogue (no subtitle translations), rated PG for maternal nudity: two nearly naked mothers sitting on the ground near Opuwo, Namibia, breast feed their infants; near Bayanchandmani, Mongolia, a mother gives birth to Bayar, who's then bundled up into a tight cloth package with straps for a motorcycle ride home with his parents; on the soles of her feet red characters are inscribed on Mari in Tokyo; Hattie in SF, CA, USA, has medical monitoring devices attached to her skin.

Cute shots with smiles, cooing, and gurgling, also crying, squealing, whining; pissing and pooping; mothers kissing their babies; cats, dogs, goats (accepting abuse), even a rooster strutting on Bayar's bedside inside the yurt. Only the American mother gives her infant a bottle of formula rather than nurse at her breast.

The gaps between environments, from primitive to modern civilization, is widest separating Ponijao, playing in the dirt among ants and flies with her older brother or drinking from a stream, from the others with degrees of modern amenities. Haircuts, bathing, rituals, tantrums, siblings taunting and teasing. Transportation in strollers, inside a trailer attached to a bicycle, or just slung across mom's back.

Toys, amusements (Ponijao and her brother examine each other's genitals), mothers speaking or reading to the children. While Hattie learns to peel a banana, Bayar and Ponijao watch an animal being skinned. Crawling, standing up, taking first steps, running, dancing.

If you're a parent or a parent-to-be, you may find this film delightfully fascinating. But aren't there enough of these already? While these children appear to be in good homes with caring, affectionate parents, there's not any suggestion that the world is already overpopulated with nearly seven billion human beings.

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Copyright © 2011 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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