Girls Town (1996)

Better Late Then Never

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

Awesome film. A coming-of-age film that contains a very realistic depiction of urban life and growing up in a big city. In it, 3 straight teenage girls (Patti, Angela and Emma) lose their friend Nikki, who mysteriously kills herself. Eager to find out why she did that, they manage to retrieve a journal from her home, and they soon find out that their friend committed suicide because she had been raped while she was doing an internship at a magazine company. Then the 3 girls start talking to each other about the things that have recently been going on in their lives. They soon find out that they too have been/are being forced into sex by the men they've been with (or are being with). They start writing some "Subvert the patriarchy!" graffiti on their school's bathroom doors, and start making plans to take revenge on all the men that have treated/are treating them like s***.A wonderful scene is when they all wreck the car of the guy who'd raped Emma. She'd been raped at the back of his car so this was all so powerfully symbolic to take revenge that way. I couldn't stop laughing when the three girls trash the car. :D Patti's boyfriend is very violent towards her, and they also had some awesome plans to deal with him too, which ultimately will lead to them making plans against the rapist who was at least partly responsible for Nikki's death. Great film. There aren't many films like this in which poor working-class women unite together (across race divisions) and try hard to deal with a misogynistic, racist patriarchal society. The way they start feeling the harsh symptoms of it is telling.I loved the Audre Lorde quote ("The fact that we are here and that I speak these words is an attempt to break that silence and bridge some of those differences between us, for it is not difference which immobilizes us, but silence. And there are so many silences to be broken.") near the end, suggesting that the three teenage girls have been researching into feminism, quoting from a black lesbian feminist of the Second Wave. The 1990's female rap music enhances the film. I think there might have been more female rap artists in the 90's, before all the sexist hip hop took over.The only downside is that the film was a tad bit slow at one point, and some scenes could have been replaced with others, better ones.

I accidentally ran into this movie on the Sundance channel and couldn't stop watching it. Menace and danger plus banality and boredom - high school from top to bottom, and nothing that anyone does or says in this really well-acted film is anything other than exactly what a 17-year-old would do or say. Good moments include the teen mom telling off a guy for dogging her one day and accepting his charm offensive the next; the only visible mom having no ability to say any unangry, unjudgemental thing to her tough, suffering daughter; and the ineffective and heartbreaking confrontation with the guy the three friends think drove their fourth friend to suicide. The girls are p_ssed, resentful, revengeful, smart, excited, violent, and together all in on the right scale - an excellent girls' Dazed and Confused that gets a perfect 10 for realness.

What makes this movie amazing is the simplicity. The realness of the actors (thanks to an amazing sense of improv by the three leads) is what makes this my all-time favorite movie. It is the only film I can watch consecutively and never get tired of it. Jim McKay is an amazing director, as he has come out with some other good films, but, to me, none have topped this one. Lili Taylor is phenomenal as a "street-wise" single mother still in high school. Bruklyn Harris' AngelA! is a character I would personally love to be friends with and Anna Grace's style is perfect for a teenage girl. For anyone who grew up in Queens, Brooklyn, or the Bronx, this movie brings much familiarity. For those who've never been, this film will take you there.

Despite previous reviews, I felt this movie was really well thought out, I saw this movie when it first came out and it definitely reached me. The subject touches but not meant to be a description of urban life at all. If you see the movie, you will understand what the real issue is. I am going to have to disagree with the dude who posted previously, this movie is geared towards anyone who believes in the issues that plague our youth and our young girls of color. It makes you want to break down the ideals that perpetuate class-ism, the gender binary and other issues that separate people. I hope others see it for what it is. Its reflective of the type of role our society and communities play in a developing child's mind. I think it should be shown to a mixed audience of boys and girls so that they can see the perspective of the other sex. I think it speaks a lot about violence in our schools.