This video, aimed at elementary school students, shows a variety of aspects of daily life of children on the island of Bali (Indonesia) and is one of a series on children in various countries or places (the other one in Asia being Japan). The series is intended to provide students a picture of diversity: its viewpoint is that diversity is both important to understand and is itself valuable, and that respect for differences can make "a world of friends." This video on Bali, which received a Silver Apple Award at a National Education Film and Video Festival, presents generally accurate information and quite good visual coverage of a variety of aspects of Balinese daily life, culture, agriculture, religion and, especially, the arts for which the island is famous, relating these elements to the lives of children. A single narrator speaks in a rather slow manner and enunciates clearly. Balinese music is heard when theatrical or gamelan orchestral performances are shown.
The film makes the point that arts and crafts--music, dance, theater, carving, graphic arts, and textiles--are very important in daily life in Bali and that children from a very young age learn to participate in crafts such as textile making, dance, and graphic arts. Balinese children are treated gently and they are encouraged, by word and example, to learn how to do these things by imitating adults, youths, and even somewhat older children as they practice or perform. Scenes also show how copying and imitating are used in school learning as well. Some of the children become regular performers in elaborate dance troupes, performing together or with adults. The film also shows how various arts are integrated into ceremonial life at Hindu temples and the narrator tells about the story of the Ramayana which is the basis of both dance theater and shadow puppet plays. A shadow puppet play, using oil lamps for illumination, is nicely shown and discussed. (The narrator, however, says that Bali only received electricity in 1970. It should be that rural villages only began receiving it then.) The film also shows a performance of a gamelan orchestra as well as craftsmen making bronze gongs and the wooden gong holders for such an orchestra.
Other aspects of children's activities are also discussed, such as formal school, farming, play, and games, though these are secondary to the arts. Along the way the film shows and, to a modest degree, discusses some of the contexts of Balinese children's life, such as a market with a variety of fruit and a bucket of eels, urban and village scenes to portray the diversity on Bali, and terraced rice fields with canals where children fish and swim. Temple festivals are shown where dance and the making of elaborate flower and vegetable offerings are so important.
Of interest to young viewers will be the good shots of bats in a Bat Cave Temple and forest monkeys in the context of discussing the importance of tropical forests in Indonesia generally. (The narrator mentions, but does not discuss, that these forests are called "the lungs of the world"; and a teacher could use this for discussion of world ecology.) Another item of interest will be the diverse use of bicycles for transporting people, goods, and even craft stalls. At the end the narrator says that many people visit Bali, but the ubiquitous tourists are not shown in any scenes. (The darkened backs of their heads appear in shots of one theatrical performance of the Ramayana.)
A considerable variety of information and an interesting perspective upon children in another culture is provided in this 18-minute film.
