Patti Cake$

Fed up with life in her New Jersey hometown, Patricia Dombrowski, aka Patti Cake$, hopes to follow in the footsteps of her idol and hit the road to achieve stardom as a rapper. With help from her best friend, a mysterious musician and her loving grandmother, Patti leads the charge against an army of haters, unpaid bills and the broken dreams that are holding her back.

Jasper brings a music video aesthetic of neon, graffiti and bling into a story that regularly trips out into Patti’s vivid daydreams. But the real strength of the film is in the writing. Not just the characters, but also the complex relationships between them: all are persuasively drawn. In particular, the troubled love that simmers between Patti and her hard-drinking mother (Bridget Everett) is abrasively credible.