The Red Balloon / Little Fugitive

Screening on Film
New 35mm print

The new 35mm print of Little Fugitive was made in collaboration with the Yale Film Archive using preservation elements from MoMA’s restoration of the film. The new 35mm print of Oreos – Little Girls Have Pretty Curls comes from the Film Conservancy restoration.

PROGRAM

The Red Balloon (Le ballon rouge)

Directed by Albert Lamorisse.
With Pascal Lamorisse, Georges Sellier, Vladimir Popov.
France, 1956, 35mm, color, 34 min.
French with English subtitles.
Print source: HFA

Among the most celebrated short films of all time, Albert Lamorrisse’s enduring tale of a boy and his faithful balloon friend gently extends the playfully anti-establishment surrealism of early René Clair and the social satire of Jacques Tati while similarly channeling the poetry of the silent cinema that shaped all three directors’ singular approaches to filmmaking. Indeed, The Red Balloon almost entirely avoids dialogue to instead foreground its musical play of color and striking intermingling of documentary realism—made poignant by the subsequent destruction of almost all of its war-scarred Parisian settings—and allegorical fantasy. – Haden Guest

Little Fugitive

Directed by Ray Ashley, Morris Engel, Ruth Orkin.
With Richard Brewster, Winifred Cushing, Jay Williams.
US, 1953, 35mm, black & white, 80 min.
Print source: HFA

After being tricked into thinking he has killed his older brother Lennie, seven-year-old Joey runs away to Coney Island. While Joey has his own adventures on the beach, the very alive Lennie looks everywhere for his lost brother. Winner of the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival and nominated for an Academy Award for Best Writing, Motion Picture Story, this landmark film is famous for its naturalistic, detailed depiction of 1950s Brooklyn. Its innovative use of on-location shooting, portable equipment and low-budget workarounds heavily influenced the French New Wave.