Watched it 8 times. Latinas on the Rise!
Added 8/16/2007
I really felt this movie. Independent films are improving dramatically. In most films depicting the harsh realities of growing up in the ghetto, the main characters are men, and black. I am proud now to see women playing the lead roles in ghetto stories.
I can relate to 2 out of the 3 stories. Marisol was my mother before she(my mom) was killed. I was Marisol's daughter, hungry and wondering when or if my mom was coming home.
I made a real personal connection with Oz. I related to her tomboyish ways and her attitude. Oz was tough, but only because she had to be. With an aging grandmother, and a drug-addicted mother who has repeatedly let her down in life, Oz's only choice of survival that she knew was the streets. She had to make the way for her and her brother whom she loved terribly. At seventeen, that was a lot to take on. And she thought she could, until it all came crashing down on her too fast.
Suzette was a promising young teenager. And she was just that; a teenager. With a hard-working mom who was rarely at home, Suzette was free. Too free. She broke the rules and took a chance on a situation she simply didn't understand. Daydreams defaced reality and she ended up pregnant. Seeing that the boyfriend accepted her situation, she did what most teenagers who believe in fairy tales do; she put her trust in him and a dream. Then she gets caught with his gun and ends up in juvie.
I must say that I am glad to see a film like this in a latin perspective. It shows how black and latin livelihood are very similar in the ghetto and that we are not alone in our struggles. It shows three latin teenage girls who buckle under the pressure with the choice of taking responsibility for their actions and making it better or worse.
Respectable applause. Shout out to Judy Marte (Oz). Good job on being a remarkable tomboy for the very first time. You made an impact on me.
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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Highly Recommended
Added 8/1/2007
This is a fantastic movie about teenagers dealing with real life issues. I watched it and had to watch it again.
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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This movie takes you into the heart and soul of urban America, and gives you an idea of why generation after generation of young people keep falling into traps they're too cool to notice.
We have three stories here, all connected by an afternoon in a juvenile detention facility. There's a drug dealer, who is a streetwise girl but gets caught up in a bad deal. Then there's an innocent schoolgirl, who gets sweet-talked and impregnated by a neighborhood thug. Finally, a drug addict who leaves her toddler daughter screaming in hunger to go buy food, but instead spends her money on drugs and carelessly gives the food to the crack man.
As you watch this movie, you want to pound on the TV and ask these young people what the hell they're thinking. Especially the youngest of them, who sees her babydaddy smoking blunts, swigging '40s and playing Russian Roulette during an ordinary stop at a friend's "crib." You just want to jump through the screen and talk some sense into this poor kid.
For fear of spoiling the movie, I won't describe specific scenes. But this movie is an absolute classic, and you need to see it. These are the people you see in the welfare lines, in juvenile court, or just the ones on the corner with babies in strollers, stirring up trouble. These are their stories.
And they will break your heart.
1 out of 2 people found this helpful.
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all bad all the time
Added 1/24/2007
This sad and gritty film has earned a half dozen festival awards and nominations. It follows the tragic fates of three young women from Jersey City's ghetto--Suzette (a pregnant runaway teenager), Marisol (a crack addict and young mother), and Oz (a drug dealer), whose lives intersect after their separate paths to prison. Nearly every influence in their lives, whether personal or social, is harmful to them, including school, music, home, friends, drug and alcohol abuse, and, most of all, their trash-talking, gangsta boys. The girls live in a malevolent universe that is parallel to anything you would consider normal. Whether they got there by bad luck, bad choices, or by a heartless society that has victimized them is debatable. The director shows his hand, though, with several shots of the Statue of Liberty.
3 out of 3 people found this helpful.
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Girls Gone Wild--"On The Outs" Quietly Examines Street Life From The Viewpoint Of Teenaged Girls
Added 1/23/2007
Chances are that if you watch much film and/or television--you won't find the subject matter of "On The Outs" to be particularly new or enlightening. This small film is a cautionary tale of drug use in the inner city and how it affects the local youth. By intertwining three character studies, the film gives you several different tales of addiction, dealing, and corruption that intersect at a juvenile detention center. But while the stories told in "On The Outs" may seem quite familiar, that does not mean that this film isn't also worth seeing. For what is unusual, "Outs" is told from the vantage point of three underaged girls--and that's not a demographic that is commonly investigated in these types of film. Believably written and performed, "On The Outs" is a worthy addition to the genre of realistic urban street films.
The film follows three girls. We have Oz, a successful drug dealer who is alienated from her addict mother. She bounces into and out of the detention center frequently on routine drug busts, it's just a normal part of her regular life. Marisol, a single mother, struggles with an addiction and the potential loss of her daughter into the foster system. And Suzette, a young girl with a supportive mother, falls in love with a local street dealer and tries to enter his world. All three characters are believable and all of the actresses, though unknown, are effective at depicting the different stages within these sometimes unpleasant stories.
This is not a fun film, but nor does it seek to deliver some "important" political message. It's just a slice-of-life drama about characters caught up in a system. While you may root for them, there will be no conventional "happy endings"--their situations are too realistic to tie everything up nicely. Glimmers of hope and moments of heartbreak alternate in this quiet, small film. Effective, but not groundbreaking, the film succeeds due to the committed performances and nicely realized scenarios. KGHarris, 01/07.
5 out of 5 people found this helpful.
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