Raise your Hand (2021) Film Review
What could be mistaken for an stereotypical exploration of a distant reality, is actually just an introduction in Raise your Hand, a dramatic rendering of a widely known challenge that’s simply overseen. Once the film goes where it has to go and pivots toward something more tangible as a conflict, Raise your Hand becomes more than just a cautionary tale.
It is a sincere portrayal of the reality of millions.
It isn’t as jarring as what Larry Clark did in Kids, or what was shown as an inevitable fate in Catherine Hardwicke’s Thirteen. However, Jessica Rae’s indie attempt at navigating a difficult layer of social issues hits the mark where it has to. A show of centered performances that’s also reminiscent of autobiographical hints, Raise your Hand is simply a film that accomplishes too much with too little.
Talk about good directing and vision.
Raise your Hand tells the story of Gia, a mischievous teenager who’s not very interested in anything else but partying, covering for her friend, and blaming her mother on everything that happens to her. Her friendship with Lila is loyal, and she writes everything it means to her.
It’s not that Gia is trying to be like Lila, whose behavior is far more questionable. It’s just that she doesn’t know what else to be.
The problem is Gia can’t control herself from being in the middle ground of rebelliousness and hope. A counselor from her school can’t stop her from heading towards more dangerous territories. This is how Gia faces the most horrible threat, one she didn’t imagine but one that’s sadly present in the world she feels comfortable in.
Led by Jearnest Corchado as Gia in a very good performance, Raise your Hand has a specific story to tell. Gia’s journey from warrior to victim to hero. However, the film’s progression takes the story of the girl and turns into a reflection of modern times. This is an issue that’s far from dormant, and it’s that message that Rae is trying to evoke with her tragic, yet hopeful third act.
A few emotional scenes are responsible for establishing a tone in the film. They’re scenes that go from the brutally violent to the heart wrenching. At the center a character that manages to deviate from the obvious and archetypal, and stay in a course of social realism that feels blatantly important. Raise your Hand isn’t a perfect film, but it’s objective feels like too much of a relevant issue to omit.
If this is the way to make people think about future generations, then the effect is there. Violence, emotional or physical, is unnecessary and avoidable as it is present from a cultural point of view. We need to fight it somehow. And stories like Raise your Hand are decisive additions to a building that keeps getting stronger: Women are speaking up against a degrading society that’s used to treating them like trash.
This has to change. Now.
My only issue with Raise your Hand is that it kept distracting me with a note I just didn’t appreciate. The film is wobbly with its continuous necessity of putting Gia aside Lila. And I just didn’t get their relationship. Perhaps, there’s something that Rae is trying to tell us with this. And for that, I will just say Gia’s presence is far heavier in the dramatic setting.
