Kid thing

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Movie
German title Kid thing
Original title Kid thing
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 2012
length 83 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director David Zellner
script David Zellner
production Nathan Zellner
music The Octopus Project
camera Nathan Zellner
cut Melba Jodorowsky
occupation

Kid-Thing is an American film drama from the year 2012 with the eleven-year period of rotation Sydney Aguirre in the lead role . The screenplay was written and directed by Austin , Texas- based screenwriter , actor and director David Zellner . The producer is his brother Nathan Zellner, who was responsible for the camera, among other things. The film was shown in 2012 at various festivals such as the Sundance Film Festival and the Berlin International Film Festival . It was released in cinemas in the USA on May 25, 2013 and in Germany on August 22, 2013.

action

Ten-year-old Annie lives with her father Marvin on a goat farm somewhere in Texas. She is often bored, she doesn't feel like going to school and her alcoholic father doesn't care about her. Since Marvin spends a lot of time with demolition derbies and his goats, Annie has to keep herself busy all the time. Out of sheer boredom, she makes forays through the house during the day, rioting in father's storage room or pranking the phone at a car repair shop . The rest of the day consists only of forays through the rural area, during which she surrenders to her lust for destruction. A lot is broken, tree trunks are chopped up, maggots are crushed, toilet bowls and a birthday cake of a girl sitting in a wheelchair are smashed with a baseball bat and her gift is taken away, a large colorful lollipop is smashed or cow carcasses are shot at with a paintball gun . Also bananas are not spared from it and firecrackers blasted away.

As she is out and about in the nearby forest, she hears a woman's voice calling for help nearby. She carefully follows where the voice is coming from and finds a dried up well in the ground. The woman in the well notices Annie and calls out to her that she would like to get help to save her, since she's been down there for a while. She introduces herself to Annie as Esther, but Annie is skeptical and believes it is the devil who is trying to outsmart her. Frightened, she runs away and goes home. Once there, Marvin shows her how to hypnotize a chicken and wants to show her what unconditional love is. Annie only replies that the animals only love him because he gives them something to eat.

The next day she returns to Loch im Wald and brings Esther home-made sandwiches , Capri-Sonne , toilet paper and a walkie-talkie . Esther thanks but also begs Annie to help her and to get help from an adult. Annie remains skeptical, however, and cannot be convinced to do the right thing. She prefers to go on her forays again without thinking about Esther. One evening she radioed Esther with the walkie-talkie and asked how she was down there. Esther looks weaker and angrier because she couldn't reach Annie and she refuses to help her get out of the hole. She gets so angry that she calls Annie a bad person. Annie also gets angrier and insults Esther as a wicked witch and also very bad people. Esther's voice falls silent and can no longer be persuaded to answer, no matter how hard Annie tries. The next morning she tries to call Esther again, but the walkie-talkie only emits a faint noise. She suggests a deal to get her out if Esther takes her with her afterwards, no matter where she goes, but the walkie-talkie is silent. This moves Annie to go to the grocery store to buy drinks and bananas for Esther, which she then brings to the hole and throws down, but no voice can be heard from the hole anymore. Annie makes one last attempt and sets off a New Year's Eve bang, which she throws down the hole, but it doesn't cause any reaction. Suddenly she has a nosebleed and so makes her way home. Sad and angry, she goes to the hiding place where she stashed the stolen gift and opens it. Inside she finds a Barbie doll , which has her arms, legs and head ripped off.

When she got home, she watched Marvin having a heart attack while feeding the goats, but she didn't get any help, just watched. Then she goes back to the well, sits on the edge, dangles her legs in the hole and stares down into the darkness. She decides to take one final, final step into the unknown and jumps down.

backgrounds

The shooting of the film took place in the US state of Texas in Bryan , Angleton and Austin , among others . It was produced and staged by the Zellner brothers. Part of the costs were available from Kickstarter financing. 113 supporters contributed 10,368 US dollars to finance the film. The elaborately designed sound design comes from Nathan Zellner. For the role of Annie, the Zellner committed again Sydney Aguirre, with which David Zellner in 2004 already the eight-minute short film The Virile Man had occupied. She is the daughter of friends of the Zellner brothers.

The soundtrack for the film was contributed by the Austin-based band The Octopus Project . The theme music used at the beginning of the film was composed by the French film composer François de Roubaix for the 1971 film Les Amis (The Friends) .

reception

source rating
Rotten tomatoes
critic 77%
audience 66%
Metacritic
critic 58/100
IMDb
AllMovie
critic

The film received mostly mixed to positive reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes , Kid-Thing received a rating of 77% based on 10 positive and 3 critical reviews with an average rating of 6.2 out of 10 points and a user rating of 66% with an average rating of 3.4 out of 5 possible points. The website Metacritic calculated an average Metascore of 58 out of 100 possible points based on 7 reviews from renowned media.

Reviews

Sascha Westphal from Filmstarts.de awards 3.5 out of 5 stars and draws the conclusion:

“For several years now, American independent cinema has been blossoming small, but all the more remarkable. One of them is the fourth feature film by filmmaker David Zellner, who lives and works in Austin, Texas. His equally irritating and poetic portrait of a ten-year-old girl who rebels more or less wordlessly against the whole world has something of a dark hole that gradually draws the viewer into itself. Zellner looks into the abyss of modern life, and the deeper this gaze goes, the more tempting becomes the nothing that stares at the filmmaker. "

- movie starts

Daniel Sander from Spiegel Online says:

“The colors are too saturated for gray social horror, and Annie is neither one of the helpless sacrificial creatures nor the brave martyrs that children usually are in such films. It can be mean and freezing, as well as melancholy and remote. [...] Annie's father teaches her to hypnotize a chicken with a piece of red chalk. She smashes the birthday cake of a girl in a wheelchair with her baseball bat. She gets Esther a walkie-talkie, but refuses to get help. Things just happen, without explanation and often without a recognizable connection, some things are very funny, then again cruel. Everything is accompanied by a deceptively random soundtrack of pop rock, folk, opera and easy listening. Annie sees the world around her getting stranger and more unreal, and she accepts it because you don't tell anyone what the world should be anyway. The only person concerned with her is Esther. [...] "Kid-Thing" is a bulky film and sometimes exhausting in its unconditional determination to be as different as possible. But it can also hypnotize you and make you as docile as it happens to the chicken in the film. Once you've grooved yourself into Annie's very personal absurd wonderland, you won't want to leave anytime soon. "

- Spiegel Online

Andreas Busche from Zeit Online sums it up:

“The parallels to Maurice Sendak's classic children's book Where the Wild Things Are - a child projects its inner fears onto an alter ego - are of course obvious, with Kid-Thing being a bit more consistent. Annie acts with an irresistible impertinence, her coming-of-age is not aimed at educational purification. The child cannot be appeased, even if his growing care shows a therapeutic effect. Annie's refusal to seek help eventually escalates the situation. The demand that Esther only be saved on condition that she later takes Annie with her exposes damage that is hidden, so to speak, at the bottom of the hole. Esther's protest against her treatment means another withdrawal of love for Annie. The voice from the hole begins to be silent. But like every fairy tale, Kid-Thing has a social foundation. The barren Texas countryside through which Annie wanders describe a reality of life from which society has largely withdrawn. Annie's trail of devastation is not an expression of emancipation, but a diffuse desire for participation. A protest against the neglect. In this way, the fairy tale is constantly resisting social conditions. David and Nathan Zellner have formally resolved this dilemma. Sometimes her camera just looks long enough at the damage to nature and people until she discovers a strange beauty behind it. "

- time online

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Todd Mc Carthy: Kid-Thing: Sundance Film Review. In: hollywoodreporter.com. January 23, 2012, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  2. ↑ IMDb : Kid-Thing (2012) - Filming Locations. In: imdb.com. Retrieved July 5, 2017 .
  3. ^ A b c Bert Rebhandl: Filmmaker Zellner on "Kid-Thing": "Annie sees the world as more mysterious". In: Taz.de . August 22, 2013. Retrieved July 4, 2017 .
  4. ↑ Zellner Bros .: "KID-THING" - a zellner bros. Movie. In: kickstarter.com. December 18, 2010, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  5. ↑ Don Simpson: David Zellner, Nathan Zellner & Sydney Aguirre (Kid-Thing) - Video Interview. In: smellslikescreenspirit.com. March 27, 2012, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  6. ^ The Octopus Project: Info. In: theoctopusproject.com. Retrieved July 4, 2017 .
  7. ↑ a b c © Fandango: Kid-Thing. In: rottentomatoes.com. August 6, 2013, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  8. ^ A b Metacritic - CBS Interactive Inc .: Kid-Thing. In: metacritic.com. August 7, 2013, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  9. ↑ IMDb : Kid-Thing (2012) - User ratings. In: imdb.com. Retrieved July 4, 2017 .
  10. ↑ All Movie Guide : Kid-Thing (2011). In: allemovie.com. May 24, 2013, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  11. ^ Ronnie Scheib: Review: 'Kid-Thing'. In: variety.com. January 23, 2012, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  12. ^ Neil Genzlinger: 'Kid-Thing' Finds a Girl in a Grown-Up Test. In: nytimes.com. August 6, 2013, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  13. ↑ Noel Murray: Kid-Thing. In: thedissolve.com. August 8, 2013, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  14. ^ Sascha Westphal: The film starts criticism for Kid Thing. In: film starts . March 2, 2012, accessed July 4, 2017 .
  15. ↑ Daniel Sander: Indie fairy tale "Kid Thing": Alone against the devil. In: Spiegel Online . August 22, 2013. Retrieved July 4, 2017 .
  16. ^ Andreas Busche: Film "Kid-Thing": Food against affection. In: Zeit Online . August 22, 2013. Retrieved July 4, 2017 .