In filmmaker Alexandra-Therese Keining's visually sophisticated Swedish teen flick, gender bending is taken to a new level as three tomboy-ish adolescent girls who are into magic and witchy ritualism stumble upon a potent gender-transforming nectar found in a mysterious flower. The teen coven of Bella (Wilma Holmén), Kim (Tuva Jagell), and Momo (Louise Nyvall) are having miserable lives as helpless victims of aggressive male bullies, but the magic flower nectar they discover in Kim's parents' greenhouse provides a temporary means of transcendence: drinking the nectar turns them into boys for 24 hours. All three girls initially find liberation in their male forms, but soon Bella and Momo begin to see that being a boy is just as awful as being a girl. Kim, however, develops a dangerous crush on a local gun-toting psychopathic teen named Tony (Mandus Berg) who initially welcomes what he assumes are homosexual advances by Kim. But as Kim falls further in love with the maniacal Tony, things spiral out of control into frustrated desire and disillusion. All of this supernaturally-tinged gender-flipping mayhem is set to a pulsing 1970s' style synth soundtrack and atmospheric female vocals. Girls Lost reminds us that adolescence sucks for everybody, and not even magic flower nectar can help. Recommended. (M. Sandlin)
Girls Lost
Wolfe, 106 min., in Swedish w/English subtitles, not rated, DVD: $26.95 Volume 32, Issue 2
Girls Lost
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