It Came From Four Star: Little Trouble Girls (2025)
Becoming increasingly fed up with streaming and digital media in general, I purchased a membership at the city's one and only Four Star Video Co-Op. Four Star is a Madison establishment with a vast DVD/VHS collection of many things you can't find elsewhere and I will be occasionally posting about the movies there I find interesting.
Little Trouble Girls (2025)
Slovenian director Urška Djukić's debut coming of age film is a character study of Lucija, a teenage girl in the middle of an emotional breakdown over her sexuality during her all-girls choir retreat. Drawing deep from the well of catholic shame around sex, Little Trouble Girls explores the contradictory narratives that young women internalize growing up.
Jara Sofija Ostan and Mina Švajger convey so much character just through facial expressions and body language alone. Lucija and Ana Maria's dynamic is the main driving force of the film and Švajger plays Ana Maria as simultaneously cruel, tender, and flirty towards poor overwhelmed Lucija.
Mixed with the film's painterly setting and cinematography is a distinctly psychosexual bent; there are intercut images of blooming flowers and lovingly lit shots of distant men in varying states of undress. What stops things from becoming too on the nose is the film's commitment to the strangeness and loneliness of Lucija's emotional journey. You will not believe what a long shot of someone's larynx can do. *