Lithuanian film “Akiplėša” (“Toxic”) wins main prize in Locarno

The Golden Leopard prize of best movie at the 77th Locarno Film Festival went to "Akiplėša" ("Toxic") by Lithuanian director Saulė Bliuvaitė. Keystone / Jean-Christophe Bott

The Golden Leopard prize of best movie at the 77th Locarno Film Festival went to "Akiplėša" ("Toxic") by Lithuanian director Saulė Bliuvaitė.

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Bliuvaitė’s feature film reflects the dreary lives of girls in an industrial city, which they want to escape with the help of a modeling career. The focus is on friends Marija and Kristina, who torture their bodies to ever greater extremes in order to stay slim and start a new life as models far away from home.

Director Bliuvaitė shows the loneliness and forlornness of the two 13-year-olds in strong, cool-coloured images. Marija has been sent away by her mother to live with her grandmother and Kristina’s father has neither time nor interest in his own daughter, but only wants to spend time with his mistress. In the poor, small children’s rooms, the girls kill time and dream of a world in which they mean something.

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Translated from German by DeepL/mga