Tutu Grande!
Is this what a Tarantino short would be like?
Never having seen more than five minutes of any Quentin Tarantino film, I really can’t say for sure, whether Derek Sitter’s 13-minute 2018 short is anything like one. But everyone always says Tarantino films really get under your skin and make your squirm a lot. After I watched Tutu Grande, I checked Google for the reviews. They all stated in one way or another that the film relates to the Me Too movement.1 That makes sense, but it would not have occurred to me otherwise. I could not shake prevailing memories of the first scene in The Godfather. Remember it? That monologue by Salvatore Corsitto in the role of the Corleone family undertaker? “I believe in America. America has made my fortune.”2 These lines open one of the most epic sagas of all time. “And I raised my daughter in American fashion.”3 Amerigo Bonasera raised his daughter to avail herself of America’s freedoms, but never to bring “dishonor” on her family. He had to make sure Don Corleone understood that his daughter, Maria, was a good girl. “Now she will never be beautiful again,” he said.4 Amerigo Bonasera sought the Don’s help. He wanted the Don to give him “justice”—to enforce retribution against the boys who raped and beat Maria; ironically, he made this request on the day that the Don’s daughter got married to a man hardly less despicable than the defilers of Maria. In The Godfather, the father of the victim begs for help from the “godfather,” but in Tutu Grande, director and writer Derek Sitter reverses—rounds out, rather—the line of empathy. He flips the script of compassion! He makes your conscience squirm as you find yourself hoping he doesn’t use the instruments of torture on his captive nemesis.
Let’s pause for a moment to think about women—the daughters and mothers. This was only my second Derek Sitter/Born Into This film experience. I’m hooked, and I’m curious if all of his films have a maternal quote at the beginning—Tutu Grande tells us, “There ain’t nothin’ good goin’ on at 3 am”) and Bugtussle gives us, “There are no bad men, just bad dirt.”5 These quotes have consonance with each other, and they give consonance to the two films.6 The Bugtussle quote is puzzling, too, after one has taken Tutu Grande into one’s brain. The mother is all through both films, spoken of constantly in Bugtussle, and most prominent at the beginning (in word) and the end (in person) of Tutu Grande.
Derek Sitter plays the lead—what? Protagonist/Antagonist? Nathan Woodworth plays the nemesis, tied and bound up on a table. Neither is pure Protagonist, neither is pure Antagonist. I’ve seen enough of Derek Sitter now to understand he would never spell it out so explicitly for you. There is no, “Here is the Bad Guy, here is the Good Guy.” Oh no. He wants you to question, to embrace (and squirm) in discontent. Sitter’s character (like Bonasera, a father of a raped girl) is not begging any godfather for help in obtaining justice. (This ain’t Sicily; this ain’t even New Jersey.) He is taking matters in his own latex-gloved hands, the Okie County way, with a cowboy hat and shit-eating grin.
“Pain is temporary. Trauma is forever.”
Do we punish those who cause trauma? Do we try to teach them a lesson? The film opens by showing you a young man (Woodworth) on a table with his hands bound behind his back. A man sits before him, ignoring him, reading a book. Enter Derek Sitter. He gloves up, the slowness of the process adding to the intensity and suspense churning in our vital organs. As soon as it’s clear how these two men are related, we begin to question our instincts. My thoughts drift a little. I recall a favorite line from the play The Winslow Boy, by Terence Rattigan: “It’s easy to do justice…very hard to do right.”7 But what is doing Right? Mercy, forgiveness? Atonement? If I was better read on Dostoevsky, I might know more about doing Right in matters of crime and punishment. Sitter’s character wants his daughter’s abuser to learn compassion for trauma victims by experiencing trauma himself. That’s the go-to attitude for most people, isn’t it? “Karma is a bitch,” they will say. An eye for an eye, a dose of your own medicine! It’s a snap-to attitude, but how effective can it be when the families of victims always feel worse after the execution?
This film has genius. That’s undeniable. You won’t find in it any satisfaction. It’s a long, drawn-out impalement. You may exhale at the close, but it won’t be a sigh or breath to give any relief, no more than we felt when the Me Too Movement successfully took down its monstrous villains. (Satisfying doesn’t feel like the right word; maybe there is some relief in knowing the monster will suffer consequences, but there’s no comfort in knowing that the trauma remains for the victim, or that there are countless victims out there whose trauma goes unpunished. Mostly, it just makes me sad to recognize the cycle of unconsciousness that humanity is trapped in.) The funny title—Tutu Grande—is explained about eight minutes in by a grande man wearing a tutu, but don’t be fooled into thinking it will bring any comic relief. Consequences for the tortured torturer take the form of familial alienation. Thus, the Woodworth character is effectively Me-Too’d, or Weinsteined—pick your 2020s social media verbiage. His sister won’t even look up at him from her phone. The older generations (mother and grandmother) are aggrieved and impassive. It’s a good film, a powerful film, though I can’t “like” it. (It’s like trying to “like” blood-pressure medication, or exercise; the effect may be good for the body, in this case soul, but it’s not fun.) I was pleased to see that the movie has a plethora of stars on Amazon Prime Video, where each verified purchaser gave it the maximum five stars, and the reviews reflect how well the message was articulated.8 “Terror Grande” might be an alternative title. It’s literally terrific.
Bates, David. “Derek Sitter: Exploring the ties between privilege and trauma.” Oregon ArtsWatch. 1 February 2021. https://www.orartswatch.org/derek-sitter-exploring-the-ties-between-privilege-and-trauma/.
“Amerigo Bonasera.” The Godfather Wiki. https://godfather.fandom.com/wiki/Amerigo_Bonasera.
The Godfather (1972). https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068646/.
ibid.
Bugtussle (2022) and Tutu Grande (2018) are both produced by BORN INTO THIS FILMS, Derek Sitter’s production company. Sitter also owns the Volcanic Theatre Pub, for live theatre and live music, in Bend, Oregon. https://www.volcanictheatre.com.
From the 1948 film adaptation of the The Winslow Boy: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0040970/characters/nm0232196.