A stately boarding school in Italy. Sunrise and mist. The building seems uninhabited, shuttered and cold. We see two figures awake in the same bed: one is a life-sized doll, the other its all-white masked puppeteer. Others – exactly the same kind of pairing – start their day in the dormitory by putting on clothes. This is daily routine, this requires discipline. The camera follows the Principal Dress, across playtime, soup for lunch, Headmistress inspection, culminating in an ecstatic scene of rupture, rapture and liberating transformation. A girl is born.

A group of ambitious people must choose different paths as they clash against money and power in a sex-driven parallel reality New York City. Up-and-coming artists Raya and Mia struggle in pursuit of individuality, as young magnates Will and Kat must decide what their influence and power will serve. Meanwhile Mia’s personal gigolo returns to his hidden world of indentured pawns in the manipulative games of the rich. In order to seek freedom and transcendence, they must first come to terms with their own human needs and natures. Plastic French is the first installment in a trilogy of films directed by Dan Simolke.

The film examines girlhood as inherited performance-costumes worn before identity forms. Mona frames femininity as simultaneous nurture and constraint, exploring how intimacy between girls and garments becomes predetermined theatre. Clothing functions as ritual and control, dictating movement before self-knowledge arrives.

Morgan and Jean work well together as true crime podcasters because they didn’t work well, at all, as a couple. However, when Morgan strikes up a new relationship with the mysterious Simone, their shared interest turns into suspicion, paranoia, and fear.