When Thomas and his family move to a new home and he has to start at a new school, all he wants is to fit in. When his pregnant mother has to take things easy, his father Simon puts him in charge of his autistic older brother Charlie. Thomas, with the help of his new girlfriend Jackie, faces his biggest challenge yet. Charlie's unusual antics take Thomas on an emotional journey that causes his pent-up frustrations about his brother to pour out...

The Black Balloon is based largely on events from co-writer / director Elissa Down's personal life. It takes a look at the lives of the Mollison family, who have moved to a new area with their two sons, one of which, Charlie, is autistic. The other son, Thomas, is at that age where image is all important. He wants to make friends at his new school and is particularly attracted to one girl, Jackie. But when Charlie breaks out of the house Thomas chases after him and ends up following Charlie into a house when he decides he needs to use the bathroom. Unfortunately the house happens to be Jackie's and she's not overly impressed to have her shower interrupted by two boys running into her bathroom.

After this incident Thomas thinks he's totally blown his chances at impressing Jackie, but is surprised to see that she's much more mature than he thought. In fact, it's the character of Jackie that helps to ground this movie in reality.

In so many movies the supporting teenage girl characters always seem to be a little cliched - either popular and bitchy, or the life and soul of the party and overly confident. Gemma Ward brings us one of the most natural teenage girls you'll witness in a movie - it's a natural performance and a very realistic character.

Jackie's character is probably the one that audiences can relate to the most - as like them, she is introduced to an already functioning family unit that has bonded over the years.

Extras include an audio commentary with director / co-writer Elissa Down; Interview with Cast & Crew (32 min, 33 sec); and Photographic Slide Show.

The audio commentary is well worth listening to as Down relays a lot of behind the scenes information. Highlights include Down recounting how she had to fish her brother out of people's house when she was growing up as he was always wanting to use the bathroom; how she got the two boys to go shopping together in character, to help get them to bond, and while bowling a group of lads started teasing Luke Ford (who played Charlie); the pointing out of the director's audio cameo as the voice over the supermarket address system; Down talking about the Hospital scene which was filmed in a haunted area - where the director believes she saw a ghost; and how the spitting scene was constructed - with the two actors having fake spit syringed into their mouths which they would then spit at each other.

The Black Balloon is a moving emotional roller coaster of a movie - a coming of age film with a difference - which will leave you with a warm glow for quite some time.

9

Nick Smithson