Raising Victor Vargas

Peter Sollett cast this by putting up flyers in the housing projects of southeast Manhattan. Almost none of the cast had been in front of a camera before, and Sollett encouraged them to improvise, which is where the film's unforced, lived-in quality comes from. Victor, played by Victor Rasuk, is a Dominican teenager growing up in his grandmother's apartment and working hard to protect his standing in the neighbourhood. Judy, played by Judy Marte, has learned to treat every boy who approaches her as a threat. What develops between them plays less like romantic comedy than like two adolescents slowly putting down their poses. The film grew out of Sollett's twenty-eight minute short from 2000, Five Feet High and Rising, which won prizes at Cannes, Sundance, Aspen and SXSW. The feature was developed with support from the Sundance Institute and screened at Cannes in May 2002. Who it is for: viewers who like small-scale, naturalistic American independent films about teenagers. Who it is not for: anyone wanting plot or dramatic escalation, since the film stays inside the everyday.