Review: Sedona International Film Festival Features BALLOON - A Heart-Pounding and Heart-Warming Tale Of Flight To Freedom

The opening credits of Michael Herbig's BALLOON note that between 1976 to 1988, approximately 38,000 East German citizens failed in their attempts to flee to the West, branded as traitors, of which nearly 500 men, women, and children were brutally murdered as they neared the fenced border.

Imagine for a moment the dark and chilling contrast between rosy-eyed declarations of allegiance to the promises of an authoritarian socialist regime with the brutal murder of a man scaling a fence to freedom by the shoot-to-kill soldiers of that regime.

The time is 1979 (ten years before the fall of the Berlin Wall). The place is Possneck in the state of Thuringia, the German Democratic Republic. A Youth Dedication Ceremony (Jugendwehe) is under way. A banner proclaims, "Der Sozialismus ist die Zukunft der Jugend" ("Socialism is the future of youth"}. Families watch their children inducted as adult members of society to the oratory of a bloviating bureaucrat about the riches and splendor of the Homeland and the revolutionary innovations of its people to which they are to dedicate themselves. Meanwhile, carnage unfolds at the border as a yearning soul attempts his climb to freedom from oppression.

Not all in the audience are true believers. A skeptical father, Peter Strelzyk (Friedrich Mücke), his wife Doris (Karoline Schuch) and two children (Jonas Holdenrieder and Tilman Döbler) in tow, mocks the presentation. His grimaces, a clear precursor to what is to follow in this family's ambitious plan to flee to the West in a hot air balloon.

Peter conspires with his friend Günter Wetzel (David Kross) to stitch together and construct the balloon. The plan is to whisk the two families away when the weather turns right ~ that is, until the first attempt goes awry.

Left to themselves and aloft with a strong northerly wind, the Strelzyk's are just about two hundred meters away from success when the cloud moisture wheighs down the craft, they lose altitude, and crash.

They manage to return home to try another day. However, their failure has set the authorities afoot to identify and capture the "traitors."

At the head of the search is Lt. Col. Seidel (Thomas Kretschmann).

In marked contrast to Peter's sensitive and desperate family man, Seidel epitomizes the officious and dutiful agent of the Stasi.

Yet, in Kretschmann's gripping portrayal of Seidel, a different and more subtle side of the man emerges. He is almost begrudgingly respectful of the fugitives. As he arrives at the scene of the fallen balloon and admires its construction, he muses to the astonishment of a young border guard; "A hell of an effort!" (A phrase that he'll repeat again with a far greater sense of irony.) He goes on, "Why don't we just let them go? Since they think they'd be so much happier over there...Isn't it better to be free of the riffraff?" But the clincher is his concluding statement that will resonate for all who hear it: "Who would we be without the border. It defines us."

At a heart-throbbing pace, the search expands and a harrowing cat-and-mouse game unfolds with twists and turns that put the second attempt at a balloon escape at continuing risk. Complications mount: The affection that Peter's son Frank (Holdenrieder) has for Klara, the girl across the street (Emily Kusche)! That Klara's gregarious father (Ronald Kukulies) is an official at the Ministry of State Security. That one cannot be certain whose eyes are watching them every moment and who might be ready to report them for any suspicious movement. The impatience of time!

There are too many moments of breath-taking suspense and emotion that it would be unfair to spoil them with detailed accounts. This is a passionate film of daring that must be seen to be believed and admired.

Based on a true story and brilliantly directed by Herbig, BALLOON is heart-wrenching, taut and suspenseful, an outstanding edge-of-your seat thriller with heart.

BALLOON is one of the featured films at this year's Sedona International Film Festival.

Photo credit to Marco Nagel/Studiocanal ~ David Kross as Günter Wetzel

Sedona International Film Festival ~ https://sedonafilmfestival.com/ ~ 928-282-1177 ~ Saturday, February 22nd through Sunday, March 1st.

Purchase passes at https://sedonafilmfestival.com/purchase-passes/

Multiple venues: Mary D. Fisher Theatre, 2030 W. Highway 89A; Harkins Theatres, 2081 W. Highway 89A; Sedona Performing Arts Center, 995 Upper Red Rock Loop Road