Moviecut—A Girl's Own Story

source: A Girl's Own Story

A girl growing up in the era when the Beatles were what girls going through puberty obsessed about, deals with her own boring life in a dull fashion. When I looked at three of Jane Campion's early short subjects, I discovered they were about trivial and boring issues of the moment: the sort of boredom that inspires us to creativity, insanity, or worst of all, to become award-winning film-makers. We all wish to be beautiful, brilliant, desired, living in a stress-free world that engages us at every moment, but over which we have full control. Alas, none of us get that. Some of them, in our daydreams, cause us to say "What was I thinking?" I'm afraid this short subject is one of those moments. Not only do I not know what I am thinking of, I'm not sure that I know what Miss Campion was thinking about, except possibly that growing up is hard.

I recently watched "In the Cut," and found its connectives strange and exciting. So I went to this to see them when young and raw. Supposedly, this is Campion's first long form film. It didn't quite work as a film the first time because it is so fractionated. Her earlier "Passionless Moments" was in the Greenaway tradition of aggregating small bits, small glances, into a world. The same is carried here and though there is a story — something actually happens to a poor girl — the bits of the story do not connect. It frustrated me. But then I got it. Breillat, for instance, stands on our side when telling us about women and especially girls. She gives the genuine insight but uses the smooth form. Campion stands on the girl's side: this fragmentation, this lack of narrative continuity, this disconnectedness from sense — it would be what the girl would experience. "Each of us has a fragile presence that fades almost as it forms." That is Campion, literally. She captures that melting snowflake, the tragedy of the melt from within. The collapse of order. There is nothing like visiting the beginnings of filmmakers you have come to trust. Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

. . . instead of that boulder near Plymouth, the population of Australia doubtless would top 400 million people Today. How is it that the "Aussies" have been such underachievers when it comes to populating the planet? A GIRL'S OWN STORY provides a lot of answers on this subject. Most of the "romantic overtures" depicted in A GIRL'S OWN STORY are of the sort that will not swell anyone's census report. And many of the few births that occur there result from sibling ribaldry. While it's true that America may harbor a few fringe "religious" cults which do a very poor job of explaining "the birds and the bees," Australia behaves as it its entire population is made up of Shakers and Fundamentalists. (If one cannot Shake our some Fun from Sunday School, why matriculate at all?) A GIRL'S OWN STORY may reek of perversity, but at least there's a glimmer of hope amid the final scene of the lady ice skater. IF the Aussies order themselves a shipment of that hot honeymoon flick from "Tonya H.," maybe someday Australian women can join "Nancy K." in exclaiming, "Why me?!"

Three girls are sexually curious Beatles fans. It's a black and white thirty minute short. It's early in the career of director Jane Campion. It's definitely edgy in its subject matter right from the beginning as the teen girls look at a drawing of the *. The most daring part is portraying the girls with all the curiosity of real teenagers. There is a dangerous energy about this film. The stories are a little jagged. They need more connective tissue and better flow. The dinner scene is compelling and the cat play scene is unforgettable. I would do away with the music video at the end but I can excuse it as experimental. Apparently, Nicole Kidman at 14 rejected the role because the material is too explicit. This is definitely intriguing for Campion fans.

Jane Campion's 1984 short film "A Girl's Own Story" is an overall stronger film than her previous work. It tells a far more cohesive story, has sharper camera work, and involves a better group of performers. It's tells an engaging story about a growing up a teenage girl in the 1960's with domestic squabbles, hormones and Beatlemania all running high. It is a very relate-able and moving film on many levels, and it impressively handles serious subject matter such as idolatry, infidelity, same sex experimentation, and incest. Unfortunately with a film that has so much going for it, the poor 1980's musical score and rather long ending keep it from being excellent.

"A Girl's Own Story" is an award-winning short film from Australia. This one was made back in 1986, so it had its 30th anniversary last year and it is still somewhat known today because writer and director Jane Campion went on to win an Oscar later in her career. It is a black-and-white movie which is of course a creative decision as basically every movie back in the 1980s had already color. It runs for roughly 25 minutes and is an early, but not very early career effort by Campion. The actors and actresses in here are not really well-known and most of them ended their careers a long time ago, some of them even did not appear in any other film before or after this one. It is basically a look into the lives of three girls and we get to watch their every day struggles with boys, parents and each other of course too. I personally felt they were all interchangeable to be honest and not a single one of them ended up memorable in my opinion unfortunately. The directing by Campion is sometimes pretty decent, but the story is just not on a level where I would give this one a thumbs-up. I also usually like black-and-white films and even from that perspective this ended up extremely forgettable. Watch something else instead unless you are a Campion completionist.

Funny and tragic stories of schoolgirls who maintain a precarious balance between kissing pictures of the Beatles and committing incest, between childhood and adulthood. Beautiful use of space heaters. The print I saw had muddy sound, though, so I had to strain to hear in some parts.

source: A Girl's Own Story