6 May 2022
Rita Moreno: Just A Girl Who Decided to Go For It (2021)
Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It tracks the remarkable life and career of iconic Hollywood trailblazer and living legend Rita Moreno, from her humble beginnings in Puerto Rico to global success on both Broadway and the big screen.
One of just 16 people to have achieved the coveted EGOT (winning an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony Award), with a Peabody Award to boot, Rita is best remembered for her role as Anita in 1961’s musical blockbuster West Side Story. The role earned her an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, and delivered its second Oscar win earlier this year for Ariana DeBose in the 2021 Spielberg adaptation, which also saw Rita nominated for a 2022 Critics Choice Award and a Black Reel Award as Valentina. In a career spanning eight decades, she’s also had memorable roles in everything from Singin’ in the Rain and The King and I to the 80s classic series 9 to 5, and award-winning prison drama Oz.
Just a Girl is executive produced by Oscar nominees Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton, In the Heights) and Norman Lear (Maude, Fried Green Tomatoes), who are also among the film’s guests, along with Rita’s West Side Story co-star George Chakiris, Golden Age silver screen star Mitzi Gaynor (South Pacific), Broadway legend Chita Rivera (Sweet Charity, Tick, Tick… Boom!), multi-Grammy-winner Gloria Estefan, Emmy nominee Eva Longoria, and Oscar winners Whoopi Goldberg and Morgan Freeman. There’s also archive footage of both Rita’s late husband, Leonard Gordon, and her former beau, Marlon Brando.
The documentary has a 95% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes, where the critics’ consensus says, “An affecting profile of screen legend Rita Moreno, Just a Girl is at once a sharp critique of the industry’s crushing inequities and a beautiful homage to an artist who never backed down despite the odds.” Rita Moreno was named one of Cinema Eye’s Unforgettables earlier this year, with Just a Girl up for Best Documentary at the 2022 Black Reel Awards and Most Compelling Living Subject at the 2021 Critics’ Choice Documentary Awards, among other honours.
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