An eleven-year-old girl becomes entranced by a dance troupe
while she’s training for boxing at a gym in Cincinnati. DRAMA
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The Fits (2015)Written and Directed by Anna Rose Holmer
Starring Royalty Hightower, Da’Sean Minor, Alexis Neblett, Lauren Gibson, Makyla Burnam, Inayah Rodgers, Antonio A.B. Grant Jr. |
I can’t believe The Fits is Anna Rose Holmer’s first and only feature length film. It’s been five years old now and I sincerely hope she has another one coming soon. The perspective she has in writing is something that comes to surface very rarely. The Fits made no money, but it did make a long festival run from September of 2015 all the way to early 2016. I think this is a film people have to see.
Toni is an eleven-year-old girl who trains with her brother at a gym near their neighborhood. They both box and Toni is the only girl who trains for that sport in the entire gym. On the other end of the gym, a successful dance troupe trains. Toni decides to try out for the dancing team but has no idea what she signed up for. As Toni starts to get the hang of dancing, one of the older girls on the team has a seizure-like experience and the team is never really the same after that. The Fits is visually stunning and so damn original. Every performance has style and meaning behind it. Royalty Hightower plays Toni and I absolutely need to see anything else she’s been. She doesn’t say a lot, but the people around her do and her reactions are painfully real. Alexis Neblett also gives a pretty amazing performance as one of Toni’s teammates named Beezy. The Fits is a film I really didn’t want to stop. Every minute has something new to offer and I won’t be forgetting it any time soon. |