Gina Piersanti

Gina Piersanti in a scene from "It Felt Like Love."

On Feb. 22, Hollywood will be honoring some of show biz's best at the Academy Awards -- and one Jersey City teen actress should've been one of them, some critics say.

Gina Piersanti, who started acting at age 5 through musical theater classes in her hometown of Hoboken, has been attracting attention from film critics since the release of "It Felt Like Love," an indie drama written and directed by newcomer Eliza Hittman.

In the moving film, which premiered to positive reviews at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, the 16-year-old played Lila, a young girl who fixates on a tough older guy in her quest to emulate a more experienced friend's sexual exploits. The awkward, lonely 14-year-old inserts herself into his gritty world, putting herself into a dangerously vulnerable situation.

Piersanti's performance in the bildungsroman scored her much praise, including mentions in the Village Voice's Film Poll with votes from Voice writers Sherilyn Connelly and Aaron Hillis, as well as the New Yorker's Richard Brody. She scored as many votes and mentions in the poll as veteran actress Hilary Swank ("The Homesman") and almost matched Gugu Mbatha-Raw in "Belle" and Patricia Arquette in "Boyhood."

Piersanti, who is the daughter of well-known Jersey City pop art painter Robert Piersanti, talked with The Jersey Journal's Summer Dawn Hortillosa about her film career so far and her next projects.

Hey Gina! Tell us what you love about acting and the film industry in general.

I love so much about acting, especially film. I'm a big movie fan, and movies that I watch have a huge impact on my life and how I see the world. So I'm really interested in being a part of that and telling stories.

It's also a really good outlet. You get a lot of emotion out of your system working on sets, even just auditioning. Lastly, the past year I've had so many opportunities to go to film festivals all over the world and meet so many people who are involved in the indie movie world. It's so great seeing all these different films and getting to know other actors and filmmakers.

What was it like working on "It Felt Like Love," your first feature film?

It was a challenging shoot for me because the subject matter is a little delicate and we shot it the summer before my freshman year of high school, which was a very vulnerable moment for me with all of the change and everything.

Overall, it was very intense and has been really amazing. I remember being so excited when they made a Facebook page for it -- I really had no idea what I was getting myself into. I didn't really know that it would be as successful as it has been! We've just been really lucky with press. It's been so cool hearing people's reactions and thoughts. We also just got a Gotham award nomination and two Independent Spirit nominations, which is unreal.

What other things have you been working on?

I had an ensemble role in Nathan Silver's "Uncertain Terms," which just played at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) recently. It's about a bunch of pregnant teenagers, and it was all improvised, which was crazy! It was amazing to see how it came together as a movie. I'm really proud of it!

I also worked on a short film over the summer called "Knightsville" with some of the greatest people. I haven't seen it yet, but hopefully it'll be around soon. And I have something really, really cool happening this spring that I'm so stoked about working on, but I can't talk about it yet!

Learn more about Gina Piersanti here. For more on "It Felt Like Love," click here, and watch a trailer for the film below.