Girlfight (2000) on Netflix
Diana Guzman fights at school and faces expulsion. She wants to box at Tiny's gym, but trainers bar her from competition and Hector Soto will not coach her without pay.
- Netflix3.5/5
- IMDb6.7/1010,758 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes88%
Trailer
Plot summary
Diana Guzman is a teenager in Brooklyn whose temper leads to fights at school and to the threat of expulsion. She lives in public housing with her younger brother, Tiny, and their father, Sandro, who is abusive. Sandro funds Tiny's boxing lessons, hoping for a professional career. After Diana defends Tiny in a spar at his gym, she asks to train as a boxer. The trainers permit workouts but not competition. She cannot pay Hector Soto for coaching, and her father refuses her an allowance, so she takes money from him. Hector starts teaching her the basics.
Cast
- Víctor Sierraas Ray Cortez
- Dadi Pineroas Edward
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Girlfight (2000)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Two days before pre-production on Girlfight was set to start, the film's financier pulled out, so producer Maggie Renzi and her partner, independent filmmaker John Sayles, personally paid for the entire $1 million budget themselves.
- While pitching Girlfight, director Karyn Kusama said numerous producers pushed her to cast a white actress instead of a Latina in the lead and argued that a female boxing protagonist was "unappealing" and "unbelievable".
- Michelle Rodriguez, who had never auditioned for a speaking role before, gave what Kusama called "a disaster" of an audition, yet won the lead role over 350 other hopefuls because Kusama found no one else who matched her physical power.
- To capture the feeling of being punched, cinematographer Patrick Cady used camera rigs that let the actors actually hit him or the camera itself during the boxing scenes.
- Film scholar Katharina Lindner has argued that Girlfight, one of the first boxing films built around a woman, helped spark the wave of female-led boxing movies in the 2000s, including Million Dollar Baby and Die Boxerin.
- Girlfight is credited with launching both its lead's and its director's film careers: Michelle Rodriguez went on to star in major studio films, while Karyn Kusama later directed Æon Flux and Jennifer's Body.
