By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.6
Director: Ashley Sabin | David Redmon
Country: france, japan, russia, united_states
Year: 2012
Running time: 78
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1806911/
Jason says: “When one sees a documentary with a title like GIRL MODEL on a festival schedule, it’s probably not a bad idea to schedule a little time between it and the next film to wash a bit of the scummy feeling off. What’s particularly interesting about this one is that it is that sort of uneasy-making movie without a doubt, but it also presents a bit more complex than just exploitation. GIRL MODEL is not ambiguous, but still capable of leaving the audience unsure about what it has seen.
“We start in Siberia – Novosibersk, to be precise – where model scout Ashley Arbaugh is looking for some fresh faces for an agency in Japan. Out of a large crowd assembled by NOAH Models (which has the local market cornered), Ashley chooses Nadya Vall, a willowy thirteen-year-old who has the agency employing Ashley craves. Nadya goes off to Japan alone, despite not speaking Japanese or even English, and Ashley heads back home to Connecticut.
“It’s not long before filmmakers Ashley Sabin & David Redmon reveal that Arbaugh also modeled in Japan in her teen years, and one hopes that we’re not watching history repeat itself. Nadya is a sweet kid who probably thought that she was going to be the plucky heroine in a rags-to-riches fairy tale, and while the audience doesn’t witness much in the way of active malice, loneliness and confusion soon take their toll. Redmon & Sabin are pretty hands-off with Nadya and her roommate Madlen, getting a little background information from those around the young Russian girls without doing much to diminish the
audience’s sense of just how strange this must seem.
“The time spent with Ashley, though, is what truly makes GIRL MODEL stand out. Sabin & Redmon follow her at work and home, interview her, and get access to her video diaries from her own time as a girl model, and ‘hypocrite’ might be one of the nicer things audiences call her. Her words present someone whose disdain for this business is visceral, and yet she spends her time perpetuating it, and that contradiction is fascinating. It doesn’t make her sympathetic – moments of ‘something really messed her up’ are more than balanced by ‘that’s no excuse’ – but Redmon & Sabin play those opposing aspects of her personality against each other in a way that invites the audience to react with something other than distaste, if they’ll allow
themselves.
“If they don’t, that’s understandable; Arbaugh isn’t the only one who occasionally makes one wonder just why some of these people signed a release. There are hints, occasionally, that worse things are going on that Sabin & Redmon aren’t privy to, and some may be disappointed that they don’t spend more time on that sort of sensationalistic material. It quite likely would have drowned the close looks at Nadya and Ashley out, though, and the way this situation seems to quietly crush their souls is, while horrible, undeniably powerful.
“(And if what the filmmakers said in the festival Q&A makes it to the DVD release in some sort of commentary or featurette form, it will be an even more intriguing package; one doesn’t need to know the genesis of the film or any of what went on behind the scenes to enjoy the film, but they make things even more interesting.)
“That tight focus and quiet maintenance of an exact distance (far enough to observe, close enough to see) makes GIRL MODEL an engrossing documentary. Ninety percent of it is fairly cut-and-dried, but that other ten percent makes it something special. 4.5 cats
“Seen 29 April 2012 in Somerville Theatre #3 (Independent Film Festival Boston 2012, digital)”
Julie says: “WOW!- At first I was thinking I might not be able to watch this movie to the end – but as Jay so aptly put it, while 90% of it was cut and dried. the other 10% was really something special. I don’t think I’ve abhorred anyone in a film as much as I did in this one. And yet I did feel sorry for one of them as well. What an incredibly interesting character study of Ashley. It did appear that there were stories left untold but I think there’s just so much that could have been said without having a hit put on the teller. One has to wonder about people with names like Tigan and Messiah…. ’nuff said.
“I did want to add there was some very powerful music at the end that really topped it off for me as something very well done.
And as Jay also mentioned, I’m VERY VERY surprised that releases were signed for some of this stuff.
“This film was very powerful and very disturbing …. not at all in all the way I thought it would bother me before seeing it. 4.87 cats”