‘Ruby in Paradise’

Victor Nunez’s 1993 release, one of last year’s best, is an intimate, low-key film as endearing and staunch as its heroine. A warm, perceptive depiction of everyday life, “Ruby” illuminates the inner being of a seemingly ordinary young woman in the process of creating a life for herself. It reveals the courage it can take to strike out on one’s own and to take charge of one’s own destiny. It marks the screen debut of radiant Ashley Judd (pictured), and features Dorothy Lyman as her first employer, Bentley Mitchum as Lyman’s memorably nasty son and Todd Field as a pivotal man in Judd’s life (Cinemax Friday at 8 p.m.).