Girlfight

State of the Art

by Tom Meek

Sitting balled up in a hotel-room chair and suffering from a stomach virus, writer/director Karyn Kusama is staging her own girlfight as she struggles to keep down saltines and ginger ale. But that doesn't keep her from talking about her debut feature, which was a co-winner of the Grand Jury Prize at this year's Sundance Film Festival. Girlfight describes the tribulations of a troubled teen in a dysfunctional home and in the boxing ring as she competes in the first-ever gender-blind amateur championship. "I think women feel an obligation to be pretty and accommodating, and I am just not interested in that," Kusama explains. "The whole movie, to some degree, is a response to classical storytelling, [the] classical narrative that has a very linear path. And it's almost always inhabited by men -- that concept of heroic journey [and] transformation. I just think it's interesting to see women go through that. We don't see it enough. There's always Alien, but that was two decades ago."

Like most independent filmmakers, Kusama harbored a long-standing passion for the cinema; she attended film school and then waited for her opportunity. "I was very lucky in '93 to have hooked up with John Sayles through a babysitting gig, which was kind of weird." Sayles doesn't have any children, but Kusama sat for friends of the independent film stalwart, and they introduced her when he was looking for a new assistant. She worked for him through three films, The Secret of Roan Inish, Lone Star, and Men with Guns.

Kusama then decided to make her own film. Her initial project was about a young girl who travels cross-country with two criminals. "When I couldn't find money for the first thing, John suggested that I start looking for money for the second thing and `pull out that bold boxing script I had.' " When no money for that one turned up either, Sayles came on board as the executive producer and put up a large part of the million-dollar budget, with some help from the Independent Film Channel.

The premise for Girlfight came from Kusama's own experience. "I had boxed myself [but not competitively] and was really interested in the family dynamic that was worked out in the gym, whether it was surrogate family or literal family. There's something really rich about these kids who come to the gym looking for someone to encourage them and support them." She wrote the script back in 1995, long before female boxing was accepted as a mainstream activity. "I actually banged out the first draft in a month. It was on a $100 bet with a friend. I really needed the money at the time."

Finding the right lead, a female who could box as well as act, was no easy task either. After the formal auditions turned up few prospects, Kusama and crew held an open casting call. It wasn't until the end of the process that they found Michelle Rodriguez, the film's magnetic star-to-be. "She had no acting or boxing experience or even really any life experience, and that made me nervous. But she did have this incredible presence. At the suggestion of my great casting directors, who knew that I wished I could make it work with her, they said, `Well, try. Just start working with her. You don't have to cast her, [just] see if she works out.' And she just learned at an incredibly fast rate. I was very lucky to find her."

Since the film's rave reception at Sundance and its pick-up by Screen Gems, Kusama has been on an arduous schedule prepping and promoting the film -- "I feel like the busiest woman in show business," she chuckles. "I have a sci-fi/horror project in the works. It's small budget too, more than a million but less than 10 million." Now that her first movie is a success, getting the next one made should prove less of a fight.

Girlfight opens this Friday at theaters to be announced.