Bao

Dir: Domee Shi

2018

*****

A Pixar film is generally a treat in itself but before each feature the great animation studio give animators and directors from around the world an opportunity to release something different that still manages to fit into their core style. Before watching the long-awaited Incredibles sequel, we were treated to Domee Shi’s Bao. Half way through the short I really wondered what the hell Pixar were thinking. The film begins with a woman making Baozi (a type of filled bun or bread-like dumpling). We get the impression that she is a bit lonely and her husband seems busy at work and a bit distant when at home. After her husband leaves for work one morning, a Baozi she makes suddenly comes alive (Baozi is often called Bao in Chinese and small children or the youngest in a Chinese family are affectionately called 'Bao Bao’ – Bao roughly translating as ‘baby’). The woman raises the bun as a child and the pair have wonderful days out together and a wonderful relationship. The woman is very protective of her Bao however, due to his limitations, size and the fact that he is essentially made of food. The pair regularly bond with each other over a box of doughnuts. Eventually the little Bao wishes to play with the other kids, despite his mother's over-protection. As her Bao ages into a teenager and eventually a young adult, he increasingly wants independence, while his mother wishes for more attention from him. When the dumpling introduces his new fiancée and announces his intentions to move out of his mother's house, his mother feels dejected. Bao’s seems to have grown up so fast and now she feels left behind, and in a moment of selfish panic she picks him up and swallows him whole. There was a loud gasp in the cinema and I noticed quite a few tearful young faces look up at their parents with a ‘What the hell just happened?’ expression on their faces. This was of course met with a ‘I have no f**king clue – but I think I’m outraged’ look from the adults. I nearly dropped my popcorn. How the hell are they going to end this one, I thought. However,we see the mother as she lies in bed, and her real son enters the room, revealing that the whole sequence was allegorical. Phew. The son, resembling the dumpling, is told by his father to comfort his mother, as she ignores him. He enters the room, offering a box of doughnuts to share as they both did when he was little. They then tuck in to their treat and both break down in tears – as did the whole cinema.  Afterwards, the whole family, including the son's fiancée, make dumplings, as they sit at the table watching television. It is only a eight-minute long film but I felt the same way I did after I finished War & Peace. It was a journey, I was an emotional wreck, I was almost too exhausted to watch Incredibles 2, I wanted to go home, cry and lie down. You can trust Pixar but I can see why this was a risk. Bao was written and directed by Domee Shi (the first woman to direct a Pixar short) but when pitching the film to the studio, she was concerned that they would find it too dark or culturally specific to be well received. She drew from personal experiences growing up with an overprotective mother, with whom she regularly made dumplings, and wanted to make a modern-day fairy tale and that is exactly what she achieved. It was confusing at first but I wouldn’t say Bao was a hard film to follow – far from it. I found the message to be remarkably universal and incredibly touching, even now, it’s hard to remember that the characters aren’t actually real. An absolute gem of a short film.