The big Hollywood studios' rabid support for ghetto fabulous comedy and lukewarm backing for sensitive dramas about African-American life and motion picture labor drama in Southern California has reinvigorated an independent African-American film making movement with an a creatively avant garde vengeance that has not be witnessed since Oscar Micheaux's pioneering cinema. A balance of non-stepinfechiting humor and non-preachy dramas has been the result of that cinematically noir resistance. "Nikita Blues," which premiered Friday at African-American theaters across the country, is the latest example of how the twain can meet without confounding the message.

Played by Essence Atkins (best known for her television roles in the sit-coms "The Smart Guy," "Under One Roof," and "Saved By The Bell"), the pg-13 film's title 17-year-old character Nikita Williams runs through a gamut of teen issues in Los Angeles that would prove weighty enough for a full-fledged adult. She aggressively pursues an English teacher she has a crush on, steals clothes from an urban apparel store she works at and sells them at school, and attempts to keep both activities hidden from her religiously strict but spiritually hypocritical mother played by Roz Ryan (know for her television sit-com roles in "Amen" and "Good News" and Broadway roles in "Dreamgirls" and "Ain't Misbehavin'"). Through a series of turning points—her best girl friend's attempted rape by the white half of a salt-and-pepper armed robbery duo representing the struggle between good and evil, her own attempted rape by the same man, a confrontation with her English teacher's fiancee who is also the assistant principal (played by Mari Morrow of BET's daily "Oh Drama"), getting fired after her homegirl shopping network is reported by a rival female co-worker, and a confrontation with her mother who painfully discovers both secrets—Nikita learns the true meaning of love, friendship, and spirituality.

Ryan, also one of the film's investors, acknowledged during a Q&A after a screening of the film Wednesday at Chicago's Ice Hyde Park Theater that she had some initial concerns after receiving the script from independent filmmaker Marc Cayce that her role could potentially turn stereotypically like the matriarch role in Lorraine Hansberry's "Raisin in The Sun." Ryan has often delivered post-modern interpretations of similar roles.

"I told Mark, 'Whatever you do, don't have me frying any chicken in the kitchen,'" Ryan said. "So [for the scene where Nikita and her mother have a heart-to-heart talk] they had me sitting down at the table making a cake. That ["Raisin"] was over 40 years ago, we're dealing with reality now."

One of the film's executive producers, Robert Taylor Homes alumnus Mark Bush, said production costs for "Nikita Blues" economical by filming in 35 mm on a pay-as-you-go basis, a method that often left undeveloped reels sitting in their cans until more money trickled in. Bush's niece, Ayana Bush is a graduating Chicago high school senior who plays Tangy, the best girl friend who is Nikita's amiably nagging conscience. Cayce originally produced "Nikita Blues" as a short film and expanded it to feature length after it was selected as finalist in the 1999 HBO Short Film Competition.

The pace of "Nikita's Blues" is somewhat sluggish at the beginning and it is unclear that Nikita's mother is bluffing to good obedience during the confrontation scenes from the living room to the front yard of their home, where the teen runs head-on into her English teacher's approaching SUV. But for a straightforwardly profound African-American story free of melodrama and buffoonery, this film is undeniably the ticket.

Check your local theater listings, also visit www.nikitablues.com.