Fest Track On Sirk TV Film Review: GRITT [International Film Festival Rotterdam 2021 - Virtual]
The notion of self and success can be an elusive element for an artist. Media and others only usually hear when an effort is a success or reaches a certain threshold. For many, it is an in-between life provoked by hardships and doubt. The way it is interrelated varies from country to country depending how the social services in place work and support systems make themselves available. But it is an individual journey. In "Gritt" [Tiger Competition], Brigette Larsen plays Gritt, a playwright/creative who is trying to find her voice. She starts off on a trip to NY acting as an undercover support person for a playwright friend of hers with Down's Syndrome. These earlier scenes are really dynamic especially when the two of them are eating or watching TV. Her friend seems to have a clear view when Gritt does not. Through a series of setbacks, both creative and basic, Gritt becomes listless with nowhere to stay, no grant money and varying ideas of what she wants to say.
The character tries to make decisions for the right reasons but doesn't look at the details and realize the consequence. It sends her down a rabbit hole. While some of the discussions she has (which are many -- in an almost cinema verite style) are pertinent they ultimately resolve nothing for her until things really start to fall apart. The disconnect between her intentions and her willingness to confront failure lead her through various endeavors from a women's collective to a bohemian theater of sorts and ultimately into a retreat of both physical space and her own mind. While the film is nowhere as dark as could be, the ultimate resolution after you see her begin to lose her mind does not seem realistic....the recovery does but not the logistics...which would go a different way somewhere else. It is hopeful in that way because it resolves with the idea that survival can be a choice. C
By Tim Wassberg
