'Little Trouble Girls' Courtesy of SPOK Films Share on Facebook Share on X Google Preferred Share to Flipboard Show additional share options Share on LinkedIn Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit Share on Tumblr Share on Whats App Send an Email Print the Article Post a Comment Little Trouble Girls marks the feature directorial debut of Urška Djukić, and it has been turning heads since its world premiere in Berlin. The film brings to the screen a fresh-and yes, irreverent-take on a story of sexual awakening in a deeply religious environment, told with a striking focus on sensory and sensual experience. Now, the coming-of-age film, told from the perspective of a teenage girl, is Slovenia's submission in the best international feature film category of the 2026 Oscars. It is also nominated for the European Discovery Award, which honors emerging filmmakers, at the European Film Awards. Related Stories Business AMC Theatres Raises $24.1 Million From Sale of Most of Its Stake in Gold, Silver Mining Company TV 'It: Welcome to Derry' Co-Creators Tease "Heartbreaking" End to Season The film follows Lucia, a quiet 16-year-old who joins her Catholic school's all-girls choir and befriends Ana-Maria, a popular and flirtatious older student. During a weekend rehearsal trip to the countryside, Lucia becomes drawn to a restoration worker - an attraction that strains her relationship with Ana-Maria and unsettles the group's fragile harmony. Djukić, whose short film Granny's Sexual Life won the European Film Award for best short in 2022 and the César Award for best animated short in 2023, directed Little Trouble Girls from a screenplay she co-wrote with Maria Bohr. he feature is produced by SPOK Films, with Staragara, 365 Films, Non-Aligned Films, Nosorogi and OINK as co-producers, and Sister Production as associate producer. Heretic is handling international sales Djukić spoke with THR about crafting a film rooted in sensory experience, the challenges of exploring sexual themes on screen and what comes next in her career. Was there any inspiration for the film or any story behind your decision to make it? There are many inspirations from different sources, but I started to write this film when I saw a concert of a Catholic choir of young girls. They were 17 years old, and they were singing this very powerful Slovenian folk song, expressing it with their voices. In the first row, there were three priests sitting. And it was such an interesting image to me. These celibate men in the patriarchy were watching these girls expressing themselves very strongly through their voices. Usually, throughout history, these voices of females and girls were very repressed. And even my voice when I was a young girl, I remember that I was always silenced, not really encouraged to express myself very much. So that was an important starting point. It made me really feel that there was something to explore through film here. And so I started exploring the female voice, and then going inside the body and the senses. I find it so interesting that you mention the senses, because Little Trouble Girls feels like it is about way more than "just" visuals. I was mostly focusing on the senses to make this tactile experience, this sensual, sensory experience for film. So, yeah, that was my wish. You show viewers shots of plants and flowers, among little cutaways. Was there any visual inspiration or influence for that? A lot of the process was led by intuition. I allowed myself to have an intuitive feeling that there was something that I needed to do, even without understanding it. I knew we had to shoot a lot of flowers, but I didn't have the idea that I would use them. They weren't in the script. There were many things like that. For example, there is this unrecognizable, abstract voice Lucia hears. I created that with a voice artist on set because we were experimenting, and I found it led me somewhere. And because I was working a lot as an editor before, I created a lot through editing, but also through intuition. I'd just have an inspiration when seeing the location. I just see images. And for example, when we saw this waterfall for the first time, I saw this image of women standing there and singing. And I said, "Okay, let's do this." So, some of the things were in the script, and some were created organically. How much did you dive into your own life and the lives of friends or acquaintances when it came to portraying sexual awakening and religion?Actually, I didn't go to Catholic church. My parents weren't very religious. But this is a very strong patriarchal pattern, the ideas of what the good girl should be like. This is extremely strong. We are all sitting on the history of these Catholic rules. And that influenced me a great deal. I was also surprised. It doesn't matter if you're in a liberal family or a conservative family - you're still influenced by these ideas and these rules. They're not empowering you, they're not helping you. They're making