moviereview - Towelhead

TOWELHEAD

	Teenage Jasira is sent to live with her Lebanese-American father in a non-descript sububrban street. Their ex-service neighbour Travis takes a great interest in his young, new neighbour.	score 4	moviereview rates films from 1 (unwatchable) to 5 (unmissable)
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Cast
Summer Bishil, Peter Macdissi, Aaron Eckhart, Toni Collette, Maria Bello,

Director
Alan Ball

Screenwriter
Alan Ball

Country
USA

Rating / Running Time
MA / 124 minutes

Australian Release
October 2008

Official Site

Where American Beauty revealed life behind suburban doors, Towelhead opens doors on the other side of the street. Writer/director Alan Ball’s companion to his Oscar winning feature turns over more stones and what he shows wriggling beneath is astounding in its ugliness. He’s not strayed far from what he knows best – exploring greater realities through the microcosm of idiosyncratic people going about their daily lives. As with Six Feet Under, pain, love and laughter share the same heartbeat. What sets this apart is the cultural ignorance that has saturated his post-9/11America.

After Jasira’s mother’s boyfriend helped her teenage daughter attend to some pubic pruning, Jasira (Summer Bishil) is sent to live with her father Rifat (Peter Macdissi) in a carbon-copy cul-de-sac. His neighbour Travis (Aaron Eckhart) takes an indecent interest in the young girl as does Melina (Toni Collette) whose concerns lie more with Travis than Jasira. Horribly under prepared for life, but determined to do the right thing leads the girl on a collision course with tragedy. Jasira’s relationship with a black schoolmate throws her father into paroxysm of bilious confusion while the real threat goes unnoticed.

The provocative and potentially misleading title aside (this is as far from a college pratfall movie as you can get), the beauty of Ball’s writing is ever present. It flows organically from situation, layer upon layer, building toward a crescendo of hypocrisy and dirty little secrets. His characters defy expectation, twisting and turning as he alternates lacerating satire with gut-wrenching poignancy. Foremost, the story is a hugely satisfying dissection of adolescence replete with unbearable embarrassment, dark shock, black comedy and light relief.

Throw in hot button issues of underage sex, racism, paedophilia and patriotism and you’ve got all the parts of a modern classic. Brilliantly led by relative unknowns (Bishil is sensational) with effortless support from Eckhart and Collette, Towelhead is a stunner. Really. It’s like having your head bashed about by the distressing reality of what’s probably happening right now, right next door. Scary, life-challenging stuff.

// COLIN FRASER