Filmed without narration, subtitles, or any comprehensible dialogue, Babies is a direct encounter with four babies who stumble their predictable ways to participating in the awesome beauty of
life.Needless to say, their
experience of the first year of
life is
vastly different, yet what stands out is not how much is
different but how much is universal as each in their own way attempts to conquer their physical environment.Though the language is
different as well as the environment, the babies cry the same, laugh the same, and try to learn the frustrating, yet satisfying art of crawling, then walking in the same way.You will either find Babies entrancing or slow moving depending on your attitude towards babies because frankly that's all there is, yet for all it will be an immediate
experience far removed from the world of cell phones and texting, exploring up close and personal the mystery of
life as the individual personality of each child begins to emerge.
Here's the former principal of PS 261 at a Black
Lives Matter in Schools Week event earlier this year, describing the opportunity costs of testing and test prep and contrasting the
vastly different experiences in the District 15 school where she was principal and the East New York schools where she began her career and where she mentors today: https://vimeo.com/260677448