Kathy Ortiz

Touching. Very good performances.

This film was beautifully shot and edited, and the acting and sets first rate. The director’s aim was to portray the challenges that tween girls face in today’s hypersexualized world. For immigrant girls of color in Paris, already asea in a foreign culture while enmired in their native traditions and stressed families, results can be overwhelming. The 11 year old heroine, whose performance is electrifying and poignant, is trying to find her identity as she watches her mother humiliated by having to accept a second wife. At the same time she tries to carve herself a place in the jungle of middle school. Seeking acceptance in an iconoclastic group of dancers, she finds the sexualized dance routines exciting and fun. None of these tweens seems to be really sexually aware, merely aping the things they have been exposed to. For young Amy, torn, hurt and embittered at the point of puberty, her emotions carry her into acting out in ways that cause her more pain and isolation. This is a profoundly disturbing feminist film that exposes problems and purports to have no answers, though Amy seems to break free to embrace her own path at the end, at least at that moment. Her path, as that of her fellows, will be fraught with confusion and frightening choices. A fine film, thoughtful and moving.

Wakanda forever! So many brave people in American history. A few of them were white Sotherners too! If only Reconstruction had held. But big money always wins. Good acting, involving story and characters. Another wrenching true story in the history of our tortured country.