The film “Babies” is a documentary by French filmmaker Thomas Balmès, that shadows
the first year or so of four babies from various parts of the world. Ponijao from Opuwo,
Namibia, Bayar from Bayanchandmachi, Mongolia, Mari from Tokyo, Japan, and Hattie from
San Francisco, California all face similar challenges within their vastly different cultures and
environments. One theory that seemed apparent throughout the entire film was
Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory, which “view the child as developing within a
complex system of relationships affected by multiple levels of the surrounding environment”
(Berk &Meyers, 2016, p. 26). Circumstances involving the babies’ customs, values and laws of
their native culture and country affect the babies on the macrosysyem. For instance, as an
infant Ponijao was not accused to wearing a diaper, instead she roamed bare bottom along the
dusty ground of her village. Occasionally releasing a bowel movement that is later wiped on her
