On the Outs

On The Outs is a gripping movie that every teen should see this season. The film is about three young girls living in Jersey City whose lives intersect at a juvenile detention center.

Oz is a 17 year old drug dealer. She is very butch and really carries herself as one of the guys. She fights like the guys, dresses like the guys, talks like the guys and sells drugs on the street corner with the guys. The only person she seems to have a real emotional connection with is her mentally disabled brother. In a case of irony, Oz despises drug use and people who use drugs--despite the fact that she is a drug dealer. On top of all of that, Oz has a mother who is addicted to drugs.

Suzette is 15 years old and meets a neighborhood boy named Tyrell. He shows just a little bit of interest in Suzette and she gets hot and heavy with him real fast. The two become sexually active and Suzette becomes pregnant, much to the dismay of her hardworking single mother. After becoming pregnant Suzette runs away from home to be with Tyrell, a street drug dealer who doesn't seem to have a place to live himself. On the streets Suzette finds trouble far beyond her unplanned pregnancy.

Marisol is a young mother and a crack cocaine addict. She spends much of her time on the streets. When she is arrested following an accident she is forced to face her demons face on. While in juvenile detention her daughter is put into foster care. Marisol thinks a quick fix will help her regain custody of her daughter. She is faced with the prospect of having to stay clean and become responsible to get her daughter back.

On The Outs is the best film created for young teen girls in years. Young women today are faced with so many obstacles and choices lead to consequences. This is an excellent film and the voices of the young girls seem authentic.

I just saw this movie as part of the Images of Black Women Film Festival in London. I got to say I was pleasantly surprised by the film, which I guess wouldn't be shown in the UK without this type of festival.

Set in New Jersey it follows three different young women. It's a fairly familiar tale if you've seen the likes of Boys in the Hood, Menace to Society, as it's a tale of growing up in inner city America today and the trails and tribulations that entails. That said it was an interesting take on the Genre in that it is to my mind the first film to tell this type of story from a female perspective.

Judy Marte's performance in the film is first rate as a drug dealer and reminded me of Michelle Rodriguez's in Girl Fight, one only hopes she goes on to have as good a career. Her two other co-leads give adequate performances from somewhat under written parts.

All in all a really good little movie, well worth watching.

"On the Outs" puts teen age girls front and center in as moving and disturbing docudrama like films that focused more on boys, from "The 400 Blows (Les Quatre cents coups)" to "Kids."

This is the distaff side of where the child drug dealers in HBO's "The Wire" come from, with Jersey City a strikingly similar locale to Baltimore. We see the intertwining and exacerbating problems of poverty, poor health, violence, and weak education with the destructive impact of drugs cutting a hurricane-like swath through their community and defeating individuals who try to stand up in its rip tide.

Three young black and Latina women, who intersect in the streets and in a juvenile detention facility, have the tragic contradictions of typical adolescents, especially of ones thrust way too soon into the adult world. (As Rush ironically sang: "We are only immortal for a limited time.")

We see the tough young dealer determined to make it in a man's world (the charismatic Judy Marte of "Raising Victor Vargas" as "Oz") who thinks she can nevertheless keep her family free of drugs and dealers; the loving but cocaine addicted single mom (a heartbreaking Paola Mendoza as "Marisol") who forgets to buy her daughter milk; and the naive lover (the pivotal and very non-amateurish Anny Mariano as "Suzette", who says in the accompanying film guide that she was inspired by her sister's experiences) of an older "Sportin' Life" of the streets-type -- the changes in her eyes over the course of the film illustrate the girls' trajectory.

The acting is uniformly excellent. Don Parma, in his screen debut as "Tyrell," is almost as devilishly riveting as Michael K. Williams's "Omar" in "The Wire," which is really saying something. The actresses portraying mothers and older relatives fairly showcase the difficulties these women have in preventing their daughters' from repeating their mistakes.

There are a few weaknesses. I was unclear what the passage of time was -- a month? More? We don't really understand how "Oz" got so tough and started dealing in drugs. It's a bit heavy-handed, if ironic and poignant, to frequently show the girls in silhouette to the unattainable Manhattan skyline, particularly of the Statue of Liberty. I also think writer/directors Lori Silverbush and Michael Skolnik want us to think of the bureaucrats they brush up against as rigid and uncaring, but, sorry, I don't think a foster child should be returned to an irresponsible addict not committed to a drug rehab program, regardless of how she got or stays that way. The "Scared Straight" approach didn't look effective, either, by further weakening the girls' self-esteem. At least the white middle-class employer of one girl's housekeeper mom wasn't drawn too stridently.

Some scenes use a herky-jerky whir that's a bit dizzying, and it's unclear if there's thematic consistency to its use or if they were artsy, cinematographic accidents.

The original music and selected songs were excellent, ranging from gospel (the beautiful opening "Motherless Child") to hip hop to singer/songwriter (Imani Coppola's lovely "Freedom Come"), particularly considering the small budget.

I'm not sure who the teens outside the theater were who appreciated my attending one of the last screenings in New York City, but they very helpfully directed me to the background booklet the filmmakers' produced which is essential in providing information that was not in the credits, and not just on the actresses's and creators. The booklet explains that the script grew out of a summer the creators spent working at a juvenile jail in Secaucus, N.J. and how they work-shopped the script with the actors. It also includes resource information on the problems of and solutions for girls caught in the juvenile justice system that are also linked on the film's Web site.

But there are no easy solutions for the three girls we cry for in this film, even as there are hints of hope.

There are few movies that are so honest about what's going on in the modern American poor cities. The topic of three intertwined stories from three women could be heavy-handed and awkward in the wrong hands. It isn't here. Some people might think what happens in this movie isn't real but it's quite real and happening right now in most cities to many people. The fact that there are no recognizable faces in this movie just adds to the realism. But that isn't to say that the acting was bad. It wasn't. A lot of movies are just afraid to tackle the topic of drug abuse accurately and I think this one did a fine job of showing what goes on. This isn't an uplifting movie but life isn't always uplifting. It's also very easy to blame the victim in these situations and I think this movie is sympathetic to its characters but not overly sympathetic. Well done movie. One of the best films of 2004!

I had the good fortune to see this film over the summer while I was a youth leader at my local community center. I went in the theater thinking it was just going to be one of those low-budget after school special type films trying to be hip and educational at the same time. But then as the film progressed I started to get hooked. The stories of these three girls in a down-ridden neighborhood bereft in American's society was so dynamic! Even though the look of the film was something to get used to at first 'cuz I usually enjoy movies shot on film and not on video. None of that really mattered 'cause in the end the acting and the drama portrayed made up for all of this film's flaws.