Everyone: you need to see this movie. Filmed on a micro-budget. Like, micro-micro. But stylistically bold as hell, and stylistic with a PURPOSE. Mysterious movie. Very creepy, thought-provoking, and deep. I can’t stop thinking about it. First-time director. No professional actors. Amazing. It’s opened in limited release as of today, but keep your eyes peeled for it. This is one you do NOT want to miss.
My review of The Fits is now up at Rogerebert.com.
Oh boy!!!!!
Right? I can’t get it out of my head. It’s bare-bones but with a huge and riveting style – it’s amazing – keep your eyes peeled for it!
Just goes to show you how much you can do even if you have no money. You need talent, of course …
and the ENDING. although I wouldn’t dream of giving it away.
Saw this one today. I’m a 7th grade English teacher, and always noticing how kids pass through that developmental “bridge” at very different paces. I thought the movie captured that in a way that was poignant and honest. The way Toni closes her eyes and exhales as she leans against the bathroom stall, sheltered for a moment from the overpowering energy of all those other girls…felt like a moment taken from my own memories of junior high.
Lots of mirror moments! I know that’s something you usually bring up connected to men, not women, but it definitely stood out. Along with Royalty Hightower’s powerful, thoughtful gaze.
I also loved the community center. I think every community center that has ever existed has had some variation of horizontal lines in primary colors painted against white walls like a long, flattened rainbow (I think this one was purple and yellow). It felt so familiar. And by the end, those colored lines started to feel like a path, like something inevitable, leading towards something unknown.
Beautifully done. Thanks for the recommendation – I don’t think I would have checked it out if I hadn’t read your review!
Bethany – I can’t tell you how thrilled I am that you went out and saw this.
It’s something else, right? I love your perspective as a middle-school teacher!!
That bathroom scene was amazing. and yes: mirror moments! Who am I? How do I fit in? What is happening here?
I wonder what your feelings were on the “fits” – as well as the ending?
I have thought about it quite a bit but would love to hear your thoughts. I’m not sure there’s a right answer but it is so intriguing!
I’ve been thinking about the “fits” and trying to articulate my response to them in a way that isn’t reductive or a straight one-to-one parallel. Also was hesitant to go into detail about the ending (which captivated and mystified me) because of the obvious spoilers – so feel free to censor this comment as necessary! :)
I’m sure the way we respond to the ending is intensely personal. (And also gendered? I wonder how men would respond to this movie.) Do we look at the fits as something you weather and survive? Something you take agency over? Something you glory in? I remember when I got my first period (TMI, I know)…my mother was so happy and so supportive…and I was just PISSED. “I can’t believe I have to deal with this horrible inconvenience…for the rest of my freaking life?? This is what being a woman is??” I was also a girl with brothers. I also took dance (in high school) – but was very resistant to having to “choose” between worlds, though I frequently felt that pressure. (Will never forget a dear friend telling me, as she attempted to “makeover” my high school wardrobe: “You don’t have to dress like me. Just don’t dress like your brothers!”)
I definitely sensed a victory, a self-discovery, a wholeness in that ending. It’s hard to say if it’s something Toni chose or something that happened TO her…that seems like it would be important. I’m thinking of that closing scene, where the other girls are supporting her body, and her eyes open – is she one of Them now? I’m also remembering little Beezy (who I got a kick out of) comparing notes with Maya on what their fits were like. Toni tries to enter that conversation, and Beezy snaps, “How would you know?” Which seems inconsiderate and excluding…but if the Fits are truly an inevitable landmark of female experience, it seems to validate Beezy’s point. I don’t like the idea that Toni has to go through that in order to be truly “accepted” by the other girls, to shed that outsider status. But maybe that says more about me than it does about the film.
Do the “fits” even have to be adolescence, specifically? That seems to be the most obvious reading, and I feel like I’m missing the potential for deeper interpretations. I would love to hear your thoughts.
// I wonder how men would respond to this movie. //
I know. I know my friend – the critic Glenn Kenny is totally enamored with this movie and keeps recommending it on his Twitter feed – but as far as I can tell he hasn’t written about it yet.
It feels very gendered to me – that at some point women and girls need to make a choice. Or the choice is made for them through biology – which is what I tried to express in my review. I remember getting my period too – and my reaction was exactly like yours!! I was scared and not ready – and I remember vividly thinking: “Oh. Now things will different with all the friendships I have with boys.” And I was not wrong. I was a tomboy, and had very good friendships with boys. It’s not like they rejected me – but suddenly the vibe was different. It was a rite of passage that my body started – and I was nowhere near “on board” with it.
This biological reality is the main difference between males and females – and then menopause later. So it’s like: our bodies say: Now is the time for you to be fertile. And now is the time when that will end. So there’s a different experience of your body and of Time itself because of these markers.
// I’m thinking of that closing scene, where the other girls are supporting her body, and her eyes open – is she one of Them now? //
An incredible moment: eloquent and yet also mysterious. In a way, I hoped that Toni would “hold out” – and be “the one” who resisted for whatever reason – but it’s pretty clear that that was not the story the director wanted to be told.
How about her doing the dance routine on that walkway late in the film?? I was almost in tears. With something like joy. I wasn’t sad for her – I thought she was fabulous. She was as ferociously into it as she had been into her boxing. Maybe she was on her way to becoming a rounded-out person? We all have to grow up. I don’t know.
// Do the “fits” even have to be adolescence, specifically? That seems to be the most obvious reading, and I feel like I’m missing the potential for deeper interpretations. //
Hmm. This is intriguing. I’ll have to think about it a bit more and I need to see it again.
Maybe it’s just self-hood, in general. Although that would go against the idea that The Fits are somehow part of becoming included in a larger group. So maybe you find your self-hood when you accept you are part of that larger group? That you can’t deny what you are, which is a girl?
I’m not sure about this. I don’t think it means that Toni has to give up boxing. But there may be something else that lifts her off the ground – a fuller experience of her own possibilities.
I may be reading into it but I wonder if it has something to do with rising up over the current circumstances – living in a pretty bleak-looking housing project – and realizing you can do anything?
OR: if the current stereotypical definition of being a girl means “lesser than” or “less free” than a boy (because we can get pregnant, we have to deal with sexism and all the rest) – then “the fits” mean girls DON’T have to define themselves that way.
The boys don’t have “fits.” They are already whole, they are already free. They like girls, that is clear, and accept Toni as part of their group – but they are immune to these fits.
Why?
Maybe because life doesn’t limit them – merely BECAUSE they are boys – and at some point girls have to “shed” the conditioning put on them from the outside world? Like, we have to CHOOSE. “No. I will not be a ‘princess’ or ‘daddy’s little girl’ or a ‘girlfriend’ or a ‘whore’ … I will be whatever I want to be – and completely outside of how I am defined by the men around me.”
I don’t know – it’s really interesting to think about though.