Fairly disturbing documentary about young (way young) models scouted from their homes in Siberia and sent to Japan to model. -Apparently the Japanese market likes young girls.

Our main subject here is 13, plucked from the Siberian countryside and dropped into the centre of Tokyo. The girls are basically owned by their agency, waiting around in tiny, crappy apartments to go on shoots, completely shut off due to the language barrier and a lack of cash. Ultimately they can be sent home if they gain any weight or "inches" as outlined in their contract. This creates a problem for some girls as they haven't gone through puberty yet.

This documentary was very sad because initially the girls and their families think they've won the lottery but in reality I saw it as just another form of human trafficking.

The scout who finds these girls is a former model and apparently hates the business but that doesn't stop her from finding and exploiting the girls and living in a fancy house in America. 03.13

[...]The film is obviously dark and upsetting, but it left me with so many unanswered questions. Perhaps in our age of America's Next Top Model, the directors expected a certain base understanding of the modeling industry, but I could have used some more guidance. I would have appreciated a narrator or on-screen captions saying things like "This is a recruiter. It is the recruiter's job to…" or "Nadya is now auditioning for…" Maybe I just have a way below average understanding of modeling, but the whole time I kept asking myself very basic questions that could have been easily explained, and would have made for a much more educational film.

Additionally, the filmmakers failed to elaborate on certain themes that were mentioned in passing, often by Ashley (who was an utter enigma as a character, hovering between denial and insanity). Themes like prostitution and sex trafficking, and illegal underage models. These are issues that could use some unpacking. Ashley would say something like, "We all know that some girls turn to prostitution (though she never even says the word),but I don't have any first-hand evidence of that," and then she would move onto another topic. I think in cases like this, it is the filmmakers role to step in; if not to press Ashley further in the interview than at least to provide the audience with a statistic or something. However, the directors seemed determined to keep the narrative confined to the claustrophobic world of the characters that they were following, leaving the audience to scratch their heads and speculate. Additionally, with no additional information, the viewer is left with no idea about the scope of the problem. Are situations like this the exception or the rule? Are they limited to Japan, or to this one particular agency, or should we now assume that any photograph we see in a fashion magazine has a crying Russian child behind it? What can we do to prevent situations like this? We simply are never given any of the answers.

Girl Model was an engaging and disturbing documentary, though it left me wanting to know more. It showed us the characters and told us their story, but left out a lot of the context necessary to create a holistic understanding. I'll probably end up trying to do some more research about the topic to answer some of the questions that I had, but it would have been nice it the directors had done that work for me.

Read the full review here: http://mattreviewsstuff.com/2012/04/25/girl-model/

Former model and now jaded scout (read: human trafficker),Ashley Arbaugh, reveals the ugly truth that there is no glamour in modeling.

With incredibly questionable morals on display from just about everyone, from the 13 year old Siberian child's mother pushing her daughter into modelling (read: slavery),through to the curious agency owner who knows that there is no money to be made on these girls who stay in Japan for three weeks only to return home with $2k worth of debt for the family (along with a nice mentally scarred teenager).

Ashley, the soulless globetrotting star of this film, is self-indulgent beyond belief in her self- pity, which, if you try really hard to push past her shocking, confronting can-I-slap-her exterior, you might just see a a raw and damaged woman. A template that you can easily imagine these 13 year old girls are now going to grow into themselves.

Yet another awesome example of documentary kicking fiction's butt in the creation of monstrous characters, and nothing says this better than the agent (read: child catcher) that enthusiastically talks about bringing happiness and wealth to all of the girls and their families, and how this mantra of helping others must exist because he had been a bad man in a previous life. Classic.

Watch out for one of cinema's most uncomfortable scenes when Ashley drops in to say hello to the two models in their rather compact apartment (or shall we say 'cell').