Girl Model

Here we go!!! I'll be seeing at least 8 films this year, and I'm pretty exhausted from life, but at least I'm not sick like I was last year. Fingers crossed I don't get sick any time soon.
So, to my first film of the festival, Girl Model (official website here). This is a documentary about a former-model turned scout, her work in Russia scouting girls for the Japanese market, the Russian girls who hope to become models and make it big not only for themselves, but for their families back at home in Russia, and then the experiences of these girls in Japan - a very foreign locale.
So, my take on the film - umm...what the huh?!? I still haven't figured out what kind of movies I like. Is it ones with a happy ending? Ones that throw your for a loop? Ones that make you think? Ones that are predictable?
The film highlighted some obvious ideas: the younger the better, the skinnier the better, models can be naive, models and their families could be relying on the girls for success and a new life, agencies are crafty, etc.
I know that I don't like films (maybe I should be more specific and say documentaries) that don't examine an idea in depth. Not only is this one of those documentaries but I also feel like it was just so wishy washy, confusing and even the filmmaking part of it didn't seem particularly intriguing. I mean, it wasn't particularly artistic, creative...it wasn't...errr...special.
See, I know that when Thom Powers introduces a film, he has say good things about it, but he really pumped up this film saying that it was the first documentary that he picked to be in the festival. He just "knew" that early on in the year that this film was something special. I wish I understood what he saw in this film.
I'm mighty glad that we had a Q&A with the producers and one of the more experienced models featured the film. There weren't many questions from the get go. Maybe the audience was as confused or disappointed as I was. And then, after the filmmakers gave a wishy washy answer to a question, I was about to give up complete hope. Maybe they were just completely wishy washy in general. But then, as they kept talking, they started 'revealing' more. Their wishy washiness in answering questions seemed to be because they were trying their best to be as diplomatic with their answers as possible. Basically, that part of the industry was just as confusing to them as it was to us and they were just as aghast as we were about some of the realities but for some reason needed to be careful how they dealt with it. The model didn't really have anything super enlightening to say, but in a way, her confusing and roundabout answers further solidified the notion that the industry is confusing and not fair, but aspiring models, especially ones who are so desperate to have a 'better life' just accept its weird ways, that it's an industry with some strange characters and that it's a pretty tight-knit, defensive and secretive community.
And once the lightbulb in my and the rest of the audience's head went off that there was actually more to the story that the filmmakers were hesitating to telling us, all of a sudden everyone had a question to ask. And just as to be expected, there was only time for one more question. It was a great question to tried to further get the filmmakers to voice their actual views on the issues and to help us better understand what the heck was going on with this world, and since it was clear that we figured out 'what was up', they opened up a little more to basically say, 'yeah...it's messed up'. And they also talked about a bunch of things that they'd encountered or filmed that gave you a better sense of just how wacky the world is, but I have no idea why these episode just weren't included in the final cut of the film.
So the film wasn't stellar, but thank goodness for that Q&A. I wonder if it was supposed to be a film that seemed like it was telling this on-the-surface (but wishy washy) tale, but that you were supposed to be so unsatisfied by the film that you were supposed to realize that there's more to it that the filmmakers just couldn't actually portray. I don't know...it seems like a lot to ask from an audience.
Sigh.

- picture courtesy of www.girlmodelthemovie.com