Hardened by years in foster care, a teenage girl from Brooklyn’s Brownsville neighborhood decides that wrestling boys is the only way back to her estranged father.
Acting
Elvire Emanuelle's debut will wreck you — zero vanity, all fury.
Direction
Newman shoots wrestling like combat — claustrophobic, visceral, intimate.
Writing
No redemption arcs handed out; earned emotion only.
Director
Olivia Newman
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Elvire Emanuelle had never wrestled before; she trained for four months and did 90% of her own stunts. The bruises you see are real.
Newman based the script on her 2010 short film, expanding Monique's world while keeping the unsentimental gaze that Sundance judges originally praised.
US
