Director: Tim Oliehoek
Cast: Sallie Harmsen, Pieter Embrechts, Beau Minnaert, Frieda Pittoors, Nazanin Taheri
The Balloonist is a 2025 Dutch comedy-drama directed by Tim Oliehoek, running 108 minutes, about a stubborn heritage chicken keeper whose quiet rural life is upended when a hot-air balloon pilot makes a very unwelcome crash landing on her property.
What is The Balloonist about?
Gaby has spent years quietly tending her flock of rare heritage chickens, her world small and carefully ordered. Everything changes when a loud, self-important balloon pilot falls out of the sky and lands squarely on her chicken coop, wrecking it completely. What begins as a bitter neighbour dispute quickly pulls old family wounds into the open. Gaby finds herself forced to deal not just with this infuriating intruder but with long-buried grievances and unresolved questions about her own past. The film balances absurdist rural comedy with genuinely felt drama as Gaby navigates the wreckage — literal and emotional — that the crash has left behind.
Cast & crew
Director Tim Oliehoek guides a strong ensemble led by Sallie Harmsen as Gaby, bringing quiet intensity to a character who keeps the world at arm's length. Pieter Embrechts plays the brash balloon pilot, and Beau Minnaert, Frieda Pittoors, Nazanin Taheri, Thomas Höppener, René Groothof, and Leòn Ali Çifteci round out the cast of family members and locals who each pull Gaby in a different direction.
Context & significance
Dutch cinema has a strong tradition of grounded rural comedies with real emotional weight beneath the surface humour, and The Balloonist fits comfortably within that lineage. For Persian-speaking viewers and the Iranian diaspora, the film offers an accessible, warm watch: its central theme of family conflict erupting without warning, and a protagonist forced to confront a past she would rather leave alone, resonates across cultures. The presence of Nazanin Taheri in the cast adds a small but tangible connection. The film is available in Persian dub, making it easy to watch together with family members who prefer Farsi. At 108 minutes it is a comfortable single-sitting film.
Where & how to watch
The Balloonist is available on K-Time in Persian dub and with Persian subtitles. Watch on the web, on your TV دستگاه, or on your phone — no VPN needed, no geo-blocking, and you can cancel anytime.