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Alicia Erian
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Towelhead: Sad, Disturbing, Just Like the Book
There's been some controversy and outrage surrounding Alan Ball's adaptation of Alicia Erian's novel Towelhead, which I might understand more if I hadn’t read the original work. People are calling the film "abhorrent," "ethically reprehensible and irresponsible," and "gratuitously offensive." And yet, this isn't really Ball’s fault.
Book Review: Towelhead
I first heard of Towelhead when I caught a trailer for the Alan Ball-directed film adaptation of Alicia Erian’s novel. The trailer looked like a sweet (perhaps a little bittersweet) coming-of-age story with moments of dark humor. The book is all of these things, but I was not at all prepared for exactly how disturbing it would be, or how utterly sad.
Movie Preview: Towelhead
Towelhead (which also goes by the title Nothing Is Private) was one of the movies on my to-see list at Sundance that kept getting edged down by other movies, partially because of other priorities, though I also worried that it would be really disturbing. Now the film, based on the novel by Alicia Erian, has a theatrical release date of August 8 and a trailer that has only made me more uneasy about watching the movie — though also more curious, too.
The story is of the coming-of-age variety, though this one features a 13-year-old girl (Summer Bishil) whose Caucasian mother (Maria Bello) sends her to live with her Lebanese father (Peter Macdissi) in a small suburban town.
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