Headlong
From the Archives
•
26-Jan-2016
This intimate glimpse at two teenage girls in a Moscow locker room is a simple but rich exploration of burgeoning sexuality and a search for expression. Alice can’t help but steal some glances at her teammate while she changes, catching flashes of skin, reflected in searching close-ups. The teammate is busy on her phone, giddily juggling possible boyfriends. In contrast with the demure Alice, she is all smiles and confidence, despite the fact that the boys texting her might only be interested in stealing schoolwork from her. When the subject of kissing arises, Alice makes a spontaneous move that alters their relationship. Director Nadia Bedzhanova is an assured talent -- her photographs and short films beautifully capture unsettled young people looking to fight their way out of society’s tame clutches. There’s something to be said for objective filmmaking but Bedzhanova nails the opposite approach. She’s at one with her subjects, penetrating deep with a sensitive touch.
Directed by Nadia Bedzhanova. Starring Maria Fomina and Ekaterina Ageeva. Produced by Katerina Polojentseva. D.P. Andrey Krauzov.
Up Next in From the Archives
-
Nangs
Two lovers spend their days getting high off nitrous oxide and robbing from suburban houses until one of them starts to question their purpose. “Nangs,” directed by Sam Rogers, contours an age-old tale of reckless youth, following two young Australian women, Kathleen and Ola, through a haze of dr...
-
Blind
Over the course of a tense Halloween week, a black man navigates his fraught friendships with white people. Cory Nixon directs and stars in “Blind,” a prickly satire on the sociopolitical climate of 2020 with its newly unlocked conversations on race, white fragility, and colonizer mindset. After ...
-
En Plein Air
Wandering the dappled grounds of an old farmhouse, Henry plays schoolmaster at an open-air painting retreat, where his instructional duties seem to involve holding forth at candlelit dinners in the garden and sucking down endless cans of Budweiser on the lawn while the work of painting and posing...
