Summary
A documentary about competitive table setting is not only intriguing, bizarre and as mad as you’d expect, but filled with the kinds of personalities you’d not expect outside of parody. In other words, it’s pure joy.
As soon as you enter a discussion on a documentary about the world of competitive table setting, someone will summon Christopher Guest’s name. Yet where Guest’s mockumentaries take theatre communities, dog show competitors, and mascots to their illogical extremes, Scott Gawlik’s very real SET! does the opposite. Here is a film that takes something outsiders may see as strange and normalises it.
SET! takes place in the lead-up to the Orange County Fair table setting competition, referred to in the community as the ‘Olympics of Table Setting’ events. Contestants can spend months putting together themed tables that are judged on their artistic merit, the placement of the dishes and cutlery and something more intangible for that elusive Best in Show ribbon. All it takes is a fork in the wrong place or an unfolded serviette to knock you out of contention.
As fascinating as the process might be, it’s the personalities that make this such a compelling documentary. There’s Bonnie, the veteran, whose house looks like it might be backstage at Disney’s Adventureland. When we first meet artistic rebel Hilarie, she’s drawing inspiration from a sensory deprivation tank. Tim — an unemployed cosplayer who describes it as the “whitest thing I do as a white person” — is hoping a win can restore his self confidence.
As with any competitive process there are rivals as well. Hilarie is controversial in the community for using (ethically sourced) taxidermy and shocking elements in her displays. It’s not Crystal Young, the defending champ, who earns her ire but the more traditional Bonnie, who has a very different vision of Africa for this year’s display. Meanwhile, Marie and Christel are a mother and daughter team who used to be competitors and are now working together for the crown.
It would be very easy to make fun of this group of people, but the most delightful thing about Gawlik’s film is that it never does. The competitors themselves often recognise the insanity of the situation, or actively work to subvert expectations, but the film allows this group of eclectic but linked people to tell their story in their own words. It doesn’t mean we don’t get deep into bizarre territory, especially when show day and the judging rolls around.
Sometimes its hard to find some bright lights at the end of the last 18 months worth of dark tunnels, but SET! is simply an artifact of unrestrained joy. Even if you don’t get into the actual process of visual placesetting, it’s hard not to get swept up in the passion of the people who make this their singular focus.
2021 | USA | DIRECTOR: Scott Gawlik | CINEMATOGRAPHY: Scott Gawlik | CAST: Bonnie Overman, Tim Wyckoff, Hillarie Moore, Janet Lew | DISTRIBUTOR: MIFF 2021 | RUNNING TIME: 105 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 5 – 22 August 2021 (MIFF 2021)
