February 12, 2012

Alan Ball Courts Controversy with Towelhead

by Andrew Gnerre | Published September 10, 2008

By deciding to stick with the brash title of the novel from which it's based, the moviemakers behind Towelhead grabbed people's attention and have yet to let go. The movie, which will get a limited release this Friday, September 12, 2008, and a wider release September 26, stars newcomer Summer Bishil as Jasira Maroun, a 13-year-old Arab-American struggling with both the overbearing parenting of her father and the sexual advances of her much-older neighbor (played here by a supremely scummy Aaron Eckhart). The movie is the feature film directorial debut for Alan Ball, Oscar-winning scribe of American Beauty, and also features Toni Collette and Maria Bello. Check out the trailer, which oscillates from humor to heartbreak and back again and then read MM's interview with director Ball, highlighting society's sexual double standards and how the film almost ended up with a tamer title.