“Growing up as a girl, you often collide with limiting social rules,” says Urška Djukić. “You learn to please, to perform, just to be accepted. At the same time, you’re taught to hide your wilder, more instinctive side, because it’s seen as inappropriate. But I believe that wildness is actually where a woman’s deepest strength lies. And maybe that’s exactly why, throughout history, it’s been so heavily controlled and suppressed.”
The 39-year-old Slovenian director is describing her connection to “Little Trouble Girl”, a 1995 Sonic Youth song led by Kim Gordon with a key lyric: “You’ll never know what I feel inside, that I’m really bad.” Djukić explains, “When I first heard it, I had this rare feeling of being understood.” So much so, she titled her debut feature Little Trouble Girls, the pluralisation referring to a gang of Catholic schoolgirls in Slovenia who sing in a choir, gossip maliciously, and navigate their newfound sexuality.
Key among them is 16-year-old Lucija (Jara Sofija Ostan), a newcomer to the school who’s first seen in a lengthy close-up of her ear, and then an elongated shot of her pensive face peering around at fidgety classmates. “I decided the camera had to stay very, very close to Lucija,” says Djukić. “Once you get that close, the image starts slipping out of the frame. Things escape. They can’t be neatly contained, as you can’t ‘contain’ a teenage girl’s desires.”
Premiering at Berlinale, Little Trouble Girls has slowly picked up acclaim: the Guardian gave it five stars; the New York Times, referencing Powell and Pressburger, deemed it “Black Narcissus for Gen Z”. Small in scale but emotionally heightened to capture the inherent drama of being 16 years old, the story follows Lucija’s friendship with flirtatious Ana-Maria (Mina Švajger) and others during a choir trip. At night, the giggling girls play truth or dare; during the day, nearby topless male construction workers cause friction and jealousy between Lucija and Ana-Maria.
Djukić, who co-wrote the screenplay with Marina Gumzi, was inspired to make the film after hearing a choir of Slovenian girls sing an old Slovenian folk song. “Their voices had this incredible feminine power, and it struck me how rarely female voices – both literally and symbolically – have been allowed to be fully heard. At that same concert, I noticed three priests in the audience, clearly moved too, and that contrast stayed with me: patriarchal, celibate men listening to young women’s voices filled with sexual awakening energy.” She adds, “Through the journey of one sensitive young girl, the film asks how someone shaped by patriarchal ideas of sin and shame can start to reclaim her own strength.”
The connection between religion and sex is explored throughout the film. The opening image is artwork of Christ’s wound, made to emulate a vagina; when Lucija is challenged to “passionately kiss” the most beautiful girl in the convent, she opts for a statue of the Virgin Mary. In contrast, a nun informs Lucija and Ana-Maria that while humans naturally feel biological urges, she finds a deeper satisfaction in religion, explaining that “God’s touch is different from human touch”. It’s telling that Lucija, introverted at the start, ends up escaping to eat grapes on her own, relishing each succulent bite.
It’s not always about the desire for a sexual act. Sometimes you’re drawn to something another person has; something you’re missing, but you long for it
For Lucija, Ana-Maria also opens a pathway for queer self-discovery. Sometimes frenemies and other times potential lovers, the pair practise kissing each other but are also preoccupied by photos of nude men. “I was really interested in the broader concept of attraction,” says Djukić. “It’s not always about the desire for a sexual act. Sometimes you’re drawn to something another person has; something you’re missing, but you long for it. That too is a form of sexual energy. Lucija is drawn towards something she doesn’t yet understand, but which she needs to follow in order to grow.”
Born in Ljubljana and a film graduate from the Academy of Arts in Nova Gorica, Djukić worked on shorts before her debut feature. Two years ago, she won a César Award for Granny’s Sexual Life, a 14-minute animated film about memories and shifting sexual attitudes. Her next full-length features are reportedly Wild Woman and Veronika of Desenice: one focuses on actresses, the other depicts a 15th-century witch trial in Slovenia.
“For a long time, this subject was treated as taboo, wrapped up in ideas of repression, guilt, shame – especially around female sexuality, which was often labelled as sinful,” she says about Granny’s Sexual Life. “For me, it was important to bring this history to light because it shows how deeply wrong these ideas were. The control of the female body is still such a crucial issue today. It’s something we have to keep talking about and keep challenging, because these rigid ideas don’t just belong to the past — they’re still used to limit and even enslave people.”
Little Trouble Girls took six years to materialise, but Djukić points out that even though it’s a provocative drama about religion, queerness, and a 16-year-old girl’s sexuality, she didn’t face problems content-wise when receiving funding. “At one point, I did sense that the Catholic community was a little cautious toward me, but I believe they’ve come to understand that there’s nothing to fear,” she says. “My intention was never to point fingers or place blame.”
After all, Little Trouble Girls taps so successfully into the human condition, it will likely appeal to anyone, not just little trouble girls. “The themes are universal: growing up, questioning authority, struggling with your body, feelings of shame and guilt, searching for belonging,” says Djukić. “Audiences connect because everyone remembers what it felt like to be on the threshold of adulthood and not quite knowing where you fit.”
Little Trouble Girls is out in UK cinemas now, and on BFI Player from October 13
