Indie Pick O' The Day: Just Another Girl On The IRT

Directed by Leslie Harris. This film was a labor of love for this indie filmmaker. As a black female filmmaker the doors were constantly shut in her face as she shopped around to try and get this film made. Instead she decided to raise $130,000 to make the movie and shot the entire film near her Brooklyn home in only 17 days.

Just Another Girl On The IRT tells the story of Chantel Mitchell, a hip, articulate, black high-school girl in Brooklyn, is determined not to become "just another girl on the IRT" (the IRT is one of NYC's subway lines). She dreams of medical school, a family, and an escape from the generational poverty and street-corner life her friends seem to have accepted as their lot. But personal and sexual challenges confront Chantel on her way to fulfilling these dreams.

Just Another Girl on the IRT was distributed by Miramax. It was the first feature film directed by an African American woman to be distributed by a major theatrical distributor.