MOVIE REVIEW
Towelhead (2008)
Dale Robinette/Warner Independent Pictures
There’s no point criticizing “Towelhead” solely for its
content – namely, the much buzzed about pedophilic subplot involving characters
played by Aaron Eckhart and Summer Bishil. As Roger Ebert so often notes, it’s
not what a movie is about
that makes it good or bad, but how it is
about it. In other words: It’s possible to make a good movie about pedophilia. See “The Woodman” and “Happiness” for proof.
Rather, what hampers
“Towelhead,” the directorial debut of “American Beauty” screenwriter and “Six
Feet Under” creator Alan Ball, is its steadfast preoccupation with a bland,
sleazy suburban milieu of cookie-cutter houses and perfectly manicured front
lawns with a darkly sexualized underbelly. Within that world, Mr. Ball presents types rather than characters, scene
after scene of phony drama and a narrative that grounds to a halt when it isn’t
being shocking.
That narrative
follows 13-year-old Jasira (Ms. Bishil), as her mother (Maria Bello) banishes
her to live with her selfish father (Peter Macdissi) in his Houston home. Sexually curious and perpetually aroused,
she takes a liking to Thomas (Eugene Jones), a handsome classmate at school, and
Mr. Vuoso (Mr. Eckhart), a neighborhood family man. Both Thomas and – creepily – Mr. Vuoso reciprocate her
affection. The rest of the movie plays
out those two relationships and the manifold ways in which they affect our
heroine.
In a film full of
wrongheaded moves, a few stand out. The
decision, reached by Mr. Ball and director of photography Newton Thomas Sigel, to
drench the movie in a sort of otherworldly golden glow lends it an awkward
fantastical air. This is serious stuff
and it very often is not treated that way. Further, Mr. Ball’s screenplay orients the entire production around the
scenes between Ms. Bishil and Mr. Eckhart. It plods along between them, mechanically dissecting the details of
Jasira’s life with her father and her fertile imagination and never generating much
interest in them.
The title comes from Alicia Erian’s
semiautobiographical source novel, but Mr. Ball never clearly elucidates how
the racial epithet fits into things thematically. Sure, Jasira is teased and put down a lot. Certainly, her father spends a lot of time
complaining about the various ways in which he, a Lebanese man, has been
stereotyped during the film’s Gulf War setting. But where that connects to what the movie is really about –
Jasira and her burgeoning sexuality – remains wholly unclear and the title
comes off as gratuitous as the rest of it.
TOWELHEAD
Opened on Sept. 12 in Manhattan.
Written and directed by Alan Ball; based on the novel by Alicia Erian; director of photography, Newton Thomas Sigel; edited by Andy Keir; music by Thomas Newman;
production designer, James Chinlund; produced by Ted Hope and Mr. Ball;
released by Warner Independent Pictures. Running time: 1 hour 56 minutes. This film is rated R.
WITH: Aaron Eckhart (Travis Vuoso), Toni Collette (Melina Hines), Maria Bello (Gail Monahan), Peter Macdissi (Rifat Maroun), Summer Bishil (Jasira
Maroun) and Thomas Bradley (Eugene Jones).
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