Little Big Girls
2014 · 52m · Canada
Directed by Hélène Choquette
Genres: documentary
Tones: contemplative, provocative
Early-onset puberty in girls under nine is examined, including suspected causes such as obesity and environmental contaminants and its physical and psychological effects.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Everyone expects a doc about early puberty to genuflect to concerned parents and medical authority—Choquette instead treats the subject with genuine ambivalence, letting contradictions breathe without resolving them, which is either bold or infuriating depending on your tolerance for unease.
A rigorously structured documentary that situates itself within the long tradition of scientific inquiry films while refusing didacticism; the formal restraint and tonal control—contemplative but never reassuring—mark this as work from a filmmaker deeply aware of how documentary form shapes argument.
The decision to center the girls' own perspectives and rhythms rather than adult panic or clinical explanation is what transforms this from a PSA into something resonant; it's a small formal choice that fundamentally reframes the entire subject.