03/05/2023 - There is no growing up without getting lost in Elena Kairytė’s judgement-free Lithuanian doc

Times change, and some even claim they get harder, but reassuringly, enough young people are still dazed and confused. And it’s not just the guys, as a slew of new documentaries seems to be pointing out now. Girls and women are also taking their time, making mistakes, figuring out who they are and what it is they want. Finally, they aren’t the responsible ones any more; they aren’t the Wendy to Peter Pan’s playful Lost Boys.

It’s a welcome trend, but one that can make Roberta [+see also:
interview: Elena Kairytė
film profile] feel a bit too familiar, especially after recent successes such as Lea Glob’s IDFA winner Apolonia, Apolonia [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Lea Glob
film profile]. Then again, Elena Kairytė’s fascination with her protagonist is a little harder to grasp. The title character of this movie, which has screened at Hot Docs as part of European Film Promotion's The Changing Face of Europe programme, doesn’t seem to have any specific talents or the kind of charisma that makes one do a double take. She is anxious and bored; she is waiting for something that she probably can’t even name. But there is something funny about her, too, about that damned restlessness, as she goes from talking about depression to happily swaying to music, from babysitting to tattooing some guy in a room, or simply sums up another pointless attempt at finding a stable job. “I have a bitter taste of failure in my mouth. And now, of coffee.”

Kairytė doesn’t care much about the whens or the hows, and Roberta doesn’t go into much detail when it comes to her story either. She eventually finds work abroad, that much is clear, and she survives another hair emergency. There is not a lot of explaining here, with her ever-changing hair colour, and short-term gigs, serving as the only sign that some time has passed and she might be in a whole different place now.

It gives the story the fleeting quality of a memory, one that’s already half-forgotten but still makes you feel something. As Roberta keeps on struggling – at one point introducing a clueless child to a story about the Three Little Pigs, this time burdened with debt – Kairytė gives her space, never forcing her to state what’s already obvious or to complain about her situation. Probably because Roberta would never allow it, ironically commenting on her “hobo life”.

And yet – again without going into too much detail – there is a sense of actual change by the end of the film, even though it would be hard to say why. Maybe this clichéd cry, an effortto “find oneself”, has more to do with learning how to be content, with making yourself happy, instead of waiting for others to do that. And if you need to burn your hair to a crisp while doing so, then so be it. It will eventually grow back.

Roberta was produced by Lithuanian outfit Baltic Productions.