6 Balloons (2018)

The film showed me a reality which I have never seen. It was a fusion of darkness with memories of the past which evoke happiness. Overall well done, with some definite room for improvement. I enjoyed watching our main character struggle with her own addiction which keeps her "drowning" just like a drug addict.Pro/Con: Some really great shots w/ the camera, but not enough story telling through the camera. Pro: The chapters of the boat narration kept me interested in what the moral was. Con: There were times when it was so mundane to watch I wanted to stop watching. Pro: It showed a terrific literal drowning during a very real scene. I don't know that I've seen something edited like this. It was different and it played well. Con: The pacing of the film was too even and I think this is why many viewers will find this film "boring". The colors / contrast wasn't helping tell the story either. With better pacing this may have only needed to be a 45 minute film and would have kept the audience to feel more empathy for the main characters. Pro: Acting by the main two actors was superb, three if you include the little girl. Con: I don't think the director knew what her main characters would eat for breakfast. And if she did, she didn't convey it to the audience, AKA - if we dove a little deeper with the characters we could have felt more connection.

6 balloons is about Kathy (played by Abbi Jacobson) finding out that her brother Seth (played by Dave Franco) has relapsed in his heroin addiction and this just before organizing a birthday party for her husband. It's a believable drama about dealing with a junkie in the family. Well almost believable. You can see his suffering while going cold turkey and her suffering with the dilemma between helping her brother score drugs or bringing him to a rehabilitation center instead. The suffering is believable, but for a hardcore junkie they could have said something about the constant lying, about the stealing, and about the physical signs of deterioration due to addiction. He looked well to clean to pass as a heroin addict. The acting was good, the story also, but it could have used a bit more drama to me to make it more real. Good enough to watch once though.

This movie is one of those that you're glad you saw but would never watch twice, an extremely accurate glimpse of an addict and an enabler.

This was not easy or perhaps even enjoyable to watch. But it's rawness and honesty about the opioid epedimic that affects so many young lives in America is what makes it so important and is the reason why everyone should in fact watch it. Very powerful and captivating performance by both Abbi Jacobson and Dave Franco.