My Kid Could Paint That

Fascinating documentary about a 4 year old girl who makes abstract paintings that sell for thousands of dollars. The question is raised by a 60 Minutes piece which questions whether or not the girl is actually doing the work herself (I say she is, and that this whole "controversy" is beside the point). But the bigger questions concern the unanswerable, as in "what is art?" If a little girl who is just sort of playing can make beautiful abstract paintings, then how hard could it be? What do we consider art? What are the criteria? The story of what the family went through as the result of the hatchet job by 60 Minutes ultimately makes the film a far more interesting one than it would have been otherwise. And at times the tables are turned on the filmmaker, as he becomes a figure in the film, questioned by its participants. Is this a good movie? Let's just say that I liked this film enough to watch all the "special features" on the DVD, something that I never do. See it.

Not a particularly well done documentary – the director doesn't get good enough footage to assemble a "complete" documentary, and it feels a little sloppy in the end. But Bar-Lev, whose second feature documentary this is, was lucky enough to chance upon an controversy that engages the audience nicely. I've certainly been thinking about it a lot for the past couple of days. The film is about a four year-old artist, Marla Olmstead, who took the art world by storm in 2005 with her amazingly sophisticated and beautiful abstract paintings. Marla's output produced a good $200,000 between '05 and '06. Bar-Lev wanted to document this child prodigy, but in the middle of his time spent with the family, the infotainment show 20/20, just one of a host of television news shows that covered the story, broke the angle that Marla's father, an amateur painter himself, may have coached the girl. All Hell breaks loose, the parents become pariahs, and they look to Bar-Lev as a possible savior. Unfortunately for them, Bar-Lev, who all the time has been trying and failing to get film of Marla painting one of her "masterpieces", is swayed by 20/20. It's a lot of fun to look at the evidence provided, to try to read the body language of the parents and try to read between the lines with them. You also have the issue about whether Marla herself was being exploited, which can raise a lot of debate. The film also works as an exploration of modern and abstract art. I myself am a fan of it, and I think there have been plenty of truly beautiful works of non-representational art. But, yeah, there are definitely paintings, some on display at an art auction going for millions of dollars in this film, where even I think the title of the documentary puts it perfectly. Most people are far less accepting than I. The film shows just how much the genre sticks in the craw of the general American public, and, in a sequence where the parents share a host of nasty e-mails with Bar-Lev, many seem just as angry that any of these paintings sold in the first place as they do that the paintings may be a sham. Even the 20/20 segment angles itself as an attack on non-representational art. Also featured are clips of a John Stossel news documentary about abstract art that I remember seeing a while back that really got my goat and has literally been making me angry for years now. Like many documentaries, the film benefits greatly from its DVD extras, which include a 30+ minute followup (which actually caused me to lose some sympathy for the parents; I seemed to be one of the few people who watched this movie and sympathized with them), and a great 15+ minute defense of abstract art by New York Times art critic Michael Kimmelman.

This is an exceptional movie that provides the evidence and leaves it to each viewer to decide the core mystery.

Does 4 year old Marla Olmstead paint her own modern art or is she being used by the adults around her? The documentary benefits from having begun before the 60 Minutes coverage, when the authenticity of Marla's work is unquestioned. The Olmsteads are a beautiful and loving family with two marvelous kids.

The filmmaker does a great job taking us inside their world as fame descends upon Marla. Then things really heat up when the 60 Minutes piece breaks- and the cameras are rolling on the parents as it airs.

The film does not decide for you but presents the evidence evenly, making it for me one of the most entertaining recent films.

My guess of who's really painting- The mother seems too sincere to be lying but dad appears a little shifty, and they say they work opposing shifts. The guy I suspect is really doctoring the paintings from childish to MOMA quality is the art gallery owner. There is a scene showing him doing hyper-realistic painting and he is clearly a great artist, but it also seems he may have a chip on his shoulder that he has not been recognized as a talent. They say in the movie that it's always the two men against the mother when it comes to making decisions about Marla's career, so I suspect these two are working together for the substantial financial rewards, while making it easy and technically true for Dad to say that he doesn't do the painting.

It will be interesting to see how Marla progresses artistically as she gets older and is no longer under her parent's or art dealer's control. She is certainly an engaging young girl and her story in fifteen years is potentially the subject of another film.

No matter who you choose to believe, this documentary is top notch.

We were very fortunate to have the opportunity to see this film at Sundance 2007. The filmmaker attended the (Salt Lake City) screening we went to, and graciously answered a lot of questions audience members had about it. As you can tell from the title and the plot summary, this was about a little 4 year old who seems to have a lot of talent for modern art. On the surface, there are a lot of questions raised about the nature of modern art, among other things, and that in itself would have made an interesting documentary. Refreshingly, about half way through the making of the documentary, 60 minutes did a story about this child and the result of that story changed the course of the documentary as well. I loved the way the filmmaker raised questions that he didn't answer...because he truly didn't know the answers. This was thoughtful and well done, and a thoroughly enjoyable filmgoing experience! I hope this has a measure of success.

Excellent, absorbing documentary about a 4 year old whose abstract paintings sell for tens of thousands of dollars,

The film starts as a portrait of a prodigy, but as the film-maker admits via narration, as the filming went along, and especially after a "60 Minutes" piece aired that made it look like the girl was getting help from her father, the focus of the film switched to new, and much more interesting (and troubling) questions.

Are they really the paintings of a child? What makes abstract art great and not just a child's scribble? Are these parents miss-using their child, or encouraging her talents?

The film leaves a lot of unanswered questions, which I far prefer to forced conclusions. But even more, I liked the way it made me ponder the nature of art and creativity itself.