Last night I had the privilege of going to an advanced screening of the film Pariah (thank you Reelblack!).

I’ve been hearing so much buzz about this film and attended to try to support an up-and-coming independent filmmaker, something I try to do whenever possible. And I have to admit that I expected to come away from it with the same feeling as many other times with the line “That was a good first feature length film.”

But I have to tell you that Pariah was one of the strongest first feature lengths I have seen in a long time. It took me somewhere.

Side note: I mean nothing but love when I say that other films have a “first film” feeling to them. We’ve all got to start somewhere, we’re all doing what we can with the resources we have, and for many of us just creating images of ourselves that are not represented anywhere else is an important act–and one day I’ll (hopefully) make a feature film that will also most likely have that feeling to it. But because I assume that as a starting point for us as indie filmmakers, I’m blown away when people like Miranda July or in this case Dee Rees raise the bar.

This film has the power trio of:

1. an excellent cinematographer who honors film as a visual art (rather than just a story with pictures and sound);

2.a strong script with rich characters and a story arch that pulls you in, in the hands of a skilled writer/director; and

3. a director and producer who (at least from the outside) have their sh*t together around money and are not scared to go after it (if you read the credits they got almost every grant you can get as an independent filmmaker. Also, after the film a friend told me that Dee Rees got an MBA before her MFA, which is kind of brilliant since in the end it really does come back to MONEY).

Rather than trying to write much of a synopsis or review on it I’ll just encourage you to follow the film on Facebook, and check out the dozens of articles linked there and on its website. And hopefully one if not all of these will convince you to get to the theater this weekend and support this project with a strong show of love in Philadelphia.