Marla Olmstead's paintings regularly sell for tens of thousands of dollars. In a span of a few short years, she grew from an unknown to an infamous, respected artist. Her career sends her all over the world and she is touted as a genius in the realm of abstract expressionism. What's the catch?
She is seven years old.
Documentarian Amir Bar-Lev descends into the controversy of Marla's authenticity in his "My Kid Could Paint That." The film especially benefits from the director's initial support of his subject that slowly gives way to doubt over the course of the filming. This further illustrates the inherent controversy within the intriguing story.
The level of access to the main players is exhaustive: Bar-Lev speaks to anyone and everyone involved in the story. He approaches potential buyers in the gallery, art experts (with a notable interview by Michael Kimmelman) and even the local reporter who first broke Marla's story.
His thorough breakdown of the events is interesting for a while, but inevitably proves to be boring. In fact, most of the film's first half is pretty standard fare for a documentary; it even relies on stock footage of Jackson Pollock frantically attacking a canvas.
It's the incidental gems that Bar-Lev stumbles upon that keep the film moving along through these slow spots. There is an entertaining moment where Marla casually informs the camera that one of the paintings being sold at a gallery that night was not, in fact, her own work, but that of her younger brother. The whole scene serves as an unintentional dig at abstract art.
The film's second act revolves around a CBS "60 Minutes" interview calling into question the veracity of Marla's craft. Bar-Lev is on hand to film the parents' reaction to the piece, which shows a clip of Marla being coached through a painting by her father.
This proves to be disastrous not only for the family, but also the gallery owners who are suddenly left with rooms of now-useless paintings. As the Olmsteads are beset upon on all sides by detractors, Bar-Lev unwillingly begins to form his own doubts.
Bar-Lev is on hand to witness many of the interesting dynamics that take place throughout this film. He details the ever-widening circle of people that latch themselves onto Marla's work. A business is born out of what was once a shy child's means of expressing herself. Suddenly, there is pressure on this girl to produce, and the differing ideas on how to handle this pressure cause a rift between her parents.
There are times where the movie feels like an absurdist comedy. There is something strange about watching a five-year-old girl sell a gallery full of paintings to people who can just as easily obtain the same type of paintings by visiting a kindergarten class. At one point, an art collector deadpans about secret clues Marla has left in her painting with such seriousness that he could have been a character in a Wes Anderson movie.
Often, the movie is hard to watch, partly because of the director himself. As Bar-Lev's opinion slowly swings against the Olmsteads, his guilt is evident even as Marla's parents assert their trust in him repeatedly. Bar-Lev's suspicions of Marla change the very tone of the movie, causing Marla and her parents to be examined with an increased scrutiny.
There is enough evidence in the movie for audiences to draw their own conclusions, outside of what Bar-Lev or Marla's parents would have anyone believe. Bar-Lev's suspicions never quite make the jump to accusation and the issue is still hotly debated today.
Fortunately, the movie allows insight to the controversy in such a way that everything is presented clearly and completely, and for all his efforts, Bar-Lev makes a pretty good go at it.
