dir. Jack Warren

I have been thinking a lot about transformation. Partly because my home town was ravaged by flooding a few months ago, and our area has become something alien and new. Buildings are empty hulls, a riverbank has become gorge-like, a neighborhood park is now a field of silt and debris. And on walks in my neighborhood, I’ll find myself being drawn to this destruction, over and over, trying to find anything resembling the landscape that was there before. 

And I imagine this is what gender dysphoria must feel like. To look in a mirror and see a body landscape that is foreign to you. Or, as a trans friend described to me before their gender affirming surgery, it was like looking in a mirror and never really processing your physical image. Imagine having that utter disconnection with your outward appearance and to know deep down, what the world sees, is not who you truly are. 

In that case, a metamorphosis would be welcome. To experience a destruction of the layers that you are hidden under, peeled away and removed, how freeing and glorious that would be. 

This transformative journey is the beauty within Papergirl, a short film written, directed, and edited by Jack Warren and starring Willis Weinstein. We linger in tight shots on Willis as he seems invisible to those around him, being bumped into or ignored by strangers, like he lives on another level of existence. On a crowded train, he pulls on his headphones and avoids eye contact, almost fearfully willing himself to completely disappear from others’ notice. 

Willis brings raw vulnerability to his performance as we watch him navigate a world he is apparently extremely uncomfortable in. With little dialogue and shot in an almost clinical black and white finish, we rely on Willis’s innate yet subtle ability to show timidness and discomfort in his face and body. And as his journey continues we realize it’s not the world he is uncomfortable in, it’s his skin…his body. Eventually, Willis discovers this external self is just an obtrusive and minuscule layer, and after a gooey and sticky removal process, their true self is finally revealed. Monstrously beautiful. Finally, at peace and comfort within themself, they break into a spontaneous dance. Their body, finally, no longer tightly wound and restrictive. 

This process of transformation in Papergirl isn’t gentle, it isn’t pretty, but it also isn’t destructive like my area’s recent storm; instead, it’s a magnificent liberation of self. It’s something to celebrate, not mourn. Transformation, sometimes, is taking away the burden of otherness and letting someone exist in their body, finally whole and finally seen. My trans friend describes the feeling perfectly: “It’s hard to try and put into words the feeling of looking at yourself as an adult…and actually seeing yourself for the first time ever.” With Jack Warren’s short film Papergirl, we get to witness this euphoric journey of finding one’s self, and by the end, we dance alongside our glorious lead character.