Breaktime is indeed about a passion, with the ball as cross and delight. Little matter its object: no object is absurd when the passion is true. As with all passions, the thing which saves you is also your undoing. The boy has been brought low, punished, beaten, and winds up going astray because of his ball (he has broken a school window), but it’s thanks to another ball (belonging to the group of children whose football game blocks the street he needs to cross) that he manages to get past the obstacle. The ball is his key to the world; it’s also his cross.