On July 2 Virgil Films
& Entertainment will release The Girl, writer/director David
Riker’s latest take on illegal immigration on DVD.
The film is currently in
the middle of a regional and arthouse theatrical run (it scored wins in its
film festival circuit rollout this past year) and as a result comes in with an ARR of 116
days. The box office tally thus far (and
growing) is $34,192.
It’s been 15 years since
the release of La Ciudad, which earned Riker a basket full of awards and gave
him instant credibility as a filmmaker.
Quite frankly, we expected to see a steady stream of films from him, but
just one screenplay five years ago and that was it … until now.
Ashley (Abbie Cornish — Bright
Star, Candy, Sucker Punch, etc.) is the kind of
woman that you see in the background. She’s
the waitress, the clerk at supermarket … the pole dancer at the adult club in
town; the subject of a country song.
Attractive, but not a beauty, she has reached the point in her life
where men attracted to her are only thinking about drinks and sex … too much
baggage for a relationship.
You could call her a
loser, but that almost implies that she was good at something. Motherhood isn’t her strong suit as her
little boy has become a foster kid; a single mom without custody of her own kid
… it is pretty sad stuff.
Filmmaker Riker seems to
know this character pretty well. She’s
not cardboard, but flesh and blood and for better or worse the focal point of
his story. She’s not a bad person, just
a human being without skills, much of an education or any sort of track record of
accomplishments. You can almost fill in
the blanks … high school, relationships, employment, etc.
Family? Her father is a long-haul trucker (Will
Patton) and mom, well mom, there is no mom, so when she ends up taking a ride
with him down to the Texas/Mexico border she sees a side of him that is completely
new to her. There is some easy money to
be made smuggling illegals and he’s good at it.
This sets her to thinking … that
sort of money could solve her custody problems and a whole lot more.
We get Ashley’s backstory
in waves and when added to the whole narrative — where writer/director David
Riker is taking this — it all comes together when she decides to try her hand at
being a coyote. Like we said, she’s not
much good at anything, except screwing up.
There is a two-level
story here. On the grand scale there is
the story of human grief, the struggles to survive and much more, which are all
set against the backdrop of cross-border human trafficking … it’s not pretty.
And then there is the
equally important human drama of Ashley, a screw-up of a young woman, who is
certain to end up as someone’s “bitch” in prison. How many stupid mistakes is one person allowed
to make?
Riker kicks it into high
gear when Ashley finds herself caring for a young girl named Rosa (Maritza
Santiago Hernandez) when her first attempt at being a coyote ends disastrously. She could dump her and run (that’s her
father’s advice), but instead she does something completely unexpected.
For The Girl to work, you
have to buy into Ashley’s transformation; her redemption.
And Riker, as a filmmaker and storyteller, accomplishes that in
spades. By story’s end you are rooting
for the young woman … even while everything that got her to that point is
completely wrong.
Bonus features include
the video diary from Abbie Cornish title “Through My Eyes.”
To download this week's
complete edition of the DVD and Blu-ray Release Report: DVD & Blu-ray Release Report
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