Review: 'The Novice' is a harrowing, stylishly told story of a dangerously intense rowing student.

Writer-director Lauren Hadaway makes an impressive debut with “The Novice,” a college sports drama whose raw intensity and visual punch will make a lot of people take notice.

Already, the Independent Spirit Awards have noticed, honoring the film with five nominations — including best picture, director for Hadaway, editing for Hadaway and Nathan Nugent, and two performances: Isabelle Fuhrman in lead, and Amy Forsyth in support.

Fuhrman plays Alex Dall, a freshman at a small private university, who’s intensely focused on her major in physics until she finds something to get more intense about: Rowing. Alex signs up for the novice-level crew team, and discovers some of the young women are there for fun and others — namely Jamie Brill (played by Forsyth) — are gunning to make varsity, because it means a full-ride scholarship.

Alex and Jamie become friends and rivals as they practice on the ergonomic rowing machines, each trying to beat the varsity rowers’ records. When they’re both offered a chance to practice with the varsity, they become carpool pals, and Alex listens to Jamie complain about the “silver spoon bitches” who are attending the university on their parents’ wealth.

And, as if physics and rowing aren’t stressful enough, Alex also starts a passionate romance with Dani (played by the one-named model-turned-actress Dilone), a physics TA who also sings with a college band. The two meet in fall semester, when Dani is grading Alex’s physics tests — but the relationship heats up in the spring. “I said I don’t date my students,” Dani says. “But you’re not my student any more, are you?”

Hadaway, who rowed for Southern Methodist a decade ago, brings a painful authenticity to Alex’s rowing experiences — something a viewer feels in every cramp, every bead of sweat, every blister on her palm.  She also has worked as a sound editor in Hollywood, which shows in the fierce sound mix, which captures and amplifies Alex’s obsessive focus.

Fuhrman, who was chilling as a 10-year-old in “Orphan” (2009), graduates to stardom-level attention in “The Novice.” Fuhrman embodies the exhilaration and pain of trying to compete at a high level, and how that kind of passion can curdle into something darker and dangerous. 

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‘The Novice’

★★★1/2

Opens Friday, December 17, in theaters. Rated R for language, some sexuality and brief disturbing material. Running time: 94 minutes.