Islamic groups are protesting the ethnically charged name of Alan Ball’s film “Towelhead,” but that title is a deliberate statement of purpose: Everything about the film is aggressively provocative, in both senses of the word.
“Towelhead” comes packed with so many issues — racial, social, political, familial and particularly sexual — that it often winds up feeling overheated and overburdened.
Newcomer Summer Bishil stars as Jasira, the quiet, precocious 13-year-old daughter of two despicable overgrown children. Her Irish mother, Gail (Maria Bello), sees Jasira’s budding body as competition, so she sends Jasira to Texas to live with her Lebanese father, Rifat (Peter Macdissi). He also sees Jasira’s development as a threat, though for different reasons. “Daddy doesn’t like bodies,” Jasira tells heavily pregnant neighbor Melina (Toni Collette) in a moment of clarity, but that isn’t exactly right. He’s fine with the bodies of adult women who use their femininity for his pleasure, including his gorgeous girlfriend. He’s just disturbed by Jasira’s changing body, and its implications that she’s growing up.
So he slaps her for wearing clothes he considers immodest, and generally watches over her with withering disapproval and disgust. There’s nothing enjoyable in Jasira’s life: Her parents are criminally selfish and casually abusive. Her schoolmates call her “Towelhead,” and so does Zack, the neighbor boy she babysits.
Then she discovers masturbation, and almost simultaneously, she catches the evil eye of Zack’s Army reservist dad, Travis (Aaron Eckhart). Growing up in a sexually charged environment, surrounded by strip-club ads, Travis’ readily available stash of Playboy magazines and exposed skin on TV, she gravitates naturally to the uncomplicated pleasure of orgasms. Because her parents’ sexual partners are getting all the affection, approval and attention she desperately craves, she indiscriminately seeks out her own partners.
The Gulf War is going on in the background, pushing Rifat and Travis into a tense patriotic duel over their ostentatiously displayed American flags. Jasira’s complicated relationship with an African-American classmate raises sexual issues with her dad, permissiveness issues with Melina and racial issues with everyone.
But it’s her lurid, creepy relationship with Travis that’s likely to draw the most controversy, even more so than the film’s pointedly controversial title. Eckhart has repeatedly told reporters that his scenes with Bishil were uncomfortable to film, and no wonder — they feel like child pornography. But like the rest of the film, they’re played with an unflinching intensity and a directness that feels courageous, though not for the squeamish.
Writer-director Alan Ball (creator of “Six Feet Under” and the new HBO vampire series “True Blood”) creates excruciating tension. And he draws entirely focused, committed performances out of all his actors, particularly the comically awful Macdissi, though Eckhart and Collette do terrific work, as well.
But inevitably, the focus is on Bishil, who’s riveting as the indrawn center of the film. Whether being sexualized, victimized or both, Bishil handles both sides of being provocative with equal elan. As with the rest of “Towelhead,” it’s uncomfortable to keep watching her, whether she’s in pain or pleasure. But it’s impossible to look away.
“Towelhead”
R for strong disturbing sexual content and abuse involving a young teen, and for language. 1 hour, 28 minutes. Directed by Alan Ball; starring Summer Bishil, Aaron Eckhart, Peter Macdissie, Toni Collette, Maria Bello. Opens today at Chez Artiste.
