Showing in competition at Switzerland’s Locarno Film Festival , writer-director Saulė Bliuvaitė’s debut feature “Toxic” is a hard-hitting coming-of-age story which eschews the cliches as her 13-year-old protagonists come to terms with their bodies and identities one hot summer in Lithuania. Marija (Vesta Matulytė) and Kristina (Ieva Rupeikaitė) are two young girls who form a friendship as they become aspirants for a modelling school which promises an escape from their dreary reality. “When I was 13, it was very popular for very, very young teenage girls from 12-13 years old to try and enroll in modeling agencies,” Bliuvaitė tells Variety .
“Girls from the Baltic countries were very popular. You know, pale skin and thin figures. My own experience is participating in this casting, standing in these enormously long lines in the mall.
We all look the same in this girl factory.” “I was actually enrolled in the modeling agency. I was very thin at that time – I was 14 or something.
And I remember the lady measured me, and she said, you know, you should lose from here, started to draw the lines on my body, like which parts are too big. And I remember the eyes of my mother. She was looking at her and thinking, ‘Where are these big parts that I should lose?’ When I look at it now, it was quite a harsh experience for a very young teenage girl.
” Sold by Bendita Film Sales , part of the film’s inspiration came from the 2011 documentary “Girl Model�.