Screenings

Filly Brown
The movie “Filly Brown” tells the tale of a talented and determined Latina girl (Gina Rodriguez, in a break-out performance) who writes and sings hip-hop in a very distinctive style. But hip-hop verse needs music, and when she visits a live radio show, the studio DJ, Santa (Braxton Mills), quickly lays down a track. Santa then invites Filly to record in his backyard studio, which includes a resident audience who drift in during the recording session and create the dynamics that makes Filly perform even better. The duo mesh well, and Filly offers Santa a 50-50 deal if they work together.
Smart phones are ubiquitous today, and their ability to instantly record and send videos provides the first opportunity for Filly to become more widely known. When a small time promoter named Ortiz (Chingo Bling) catches Filly singing at the studio on his i-Phone, he rushes over and offers to serve as her business manager if she will agree to emphasize sexual innuendo in her lyrics, dress and presentation. Santa has reservations and warns Filly that she could lose her “fire” if she changes focus, but he agrees to be her DJ for a club set where record executives will be present.
Even if you are not a fan of hip-hop, the presentation of these musical sets will hold your interest—but they are pretty formulaic. We have all seen talented dancers, singers, actors, painters, musicians, and dress designers raise to success in various movies, and know well how things work. What sets “Filly Brown” apart is the back story. Filly and her younger sister Lupe (Chrissie Fit) are being raised by their hard-working, contractor father Jose (Lou Diamond Phillips) because their mother Maria (Jenni Rivera) is serving ten years for using and dealing hard drugs. Filly secretly visits her mother in prison and learns from Maria that the policeman who testified at her trial has been thrown off the force. “I could get out of here,” Maria tells her daughter, “if you just pay Caeser a couple thousand.” Filly doesn’t know Caeser, so she heads to her mother’s attorney, Leandro (Edward James Olmos) and offers him money to file for a retrial.
The Olmos name is all over this film. Edward James Olmos (who was nominated for an Oscar for his iconic portrayal of the calculus teacher Jamie Escalante in “Stand and Deliver”) not only plays the lawyer, he is also the film’s executive producer, and even sings a song with Gina Rodriquez in the movie soundtrack. His son, Michael D. Olmos, is the movie’s director, and joins another son, Mico Olmos, as a co-producer.
A parallel subplot involves tattoos. Filly works in her uncle’s tattoo shop, and she turns to him for money to help his imprisoned sister. “I can’t,” her uncle tells Filly. “I almost lost my house and business paying for her defense. I can’t go through that again.” As a contractor, Jose wears long sleeved shirts to cover his tattoos—and what they reveal about his history, but the men who work for him aren’t so circumspect. Their decorated arms, necks and chests are visible as they work, and this causes friction with the realtor who hired Jose to remodel a house. “I’m going to start showing this property to people who…won’t feel comfortable with what is on display. Do you understand what I mean?”
One final note, the film is dedicated to the memory of Jenni Rivera, the singer/songwriter (selling over 15 million albums worldwide), entrepreneur, actress, and advocate against domestic violence (in 2010, the City of LA proclaimed a Jenni Rivera Day for this work). Tragically, Jenni died in a plane crash in Mexico on December 9, 2012, and the release date of “Filly Brown” was postponed until now.
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