“Towelhead,” also known as “Nothing is Private,” is the story of a young girl whose mother is Caucasian and father is Lebanese-born and how she copes with the males in her life and her sexual awakening.

The film is powerful and thought-provoking, but not always easy to watch.

Summer Bishil plays Jasira, a beautiful 13-year-old who isn't mature enough to know when to say “no.”

In a way, in a movie world with so many teens acting like they are 30, this is refreshing.

But sometimes you want to reach through the screen of this troubled girl and say, “Watch it.”

The film begins in Syracuse, with her mother's boyfriend helping her shave her bikini line.

Her self-absorbed mother, played Maria Bello, sends her to Texas to live with her strict father, played effectively by grim-faced Peter Macdisi. The stage is set when he yells at her because her plane is late. When she apologizes, he questions her on why she apologizes for something she has no control over.

The next morning, when she comes to breakfast in shorts and a top, he screams at her to make herself decent for the breakfast table. Realizing her overreacted, the best he can say is, “I forgive you.”

Bishil certainly attracts the men, from mom's boyfriend early on to the military reservist next door, played by Aaron Eckhart, best known as Harvey Dent from the “Batman” franchise.

Eckhart's character, his loopy wife (Carrie Preston) and son (Chase Ellison) meet the new family and soon Jashira is babysitting their son, three years her junior. There she discovers her neighbor takes nude photographs of women for a living and becomes mesmerized by the photos in a men's magazine. She has a sexual awakening that Eckhart's character takes advantage of in a moment of passion, but is immediately apologetic, for awhile.

Meanwhile, dad gets a French girlfriend and Jasira, while taunted by many at school, gets herself a boyfriend, played by Eugene Jones.

She agrees to what boyfriend and adult neighbor have planned and doesn't seem to mind when Eckhart's character says he is being deployed to the Gulf War (the 1991 version) and anything can happen, but then doesn't go.

Father becomes enraged when he discovers one of the magazines in his house (although he doesn't seem to mind if daughter sees he and new girlfriend prancing around the breakfast table) and hits her. Jashira takes refuge at the home of a kind, more stable couple, played by Toni Collette and Matt Letscher. Collette is pregnant but quickly befriends the girl, worried about the sex-hungry neighbor and the way her father treats her.

You feel for the girl and Bishil does an excellent job playing the part as a confused young teen. In reality, she was about 20 when she played had the role.

Some of the scenes aren't easy to watch. The characters are full and interesting. From the beginning, you watch and wonder if the horny neighbor will control himself. He isn't a monster, he only acts like one.

And Father wants to be a real American. He flies his flag properly. He becomes a Christian. But he can't shake his core beliefs about women and his racist attitudes.

All of this converges on a not-so-satisfying ending.

Yet “Towelhead” is worth the ride, if you don't mind getting a little squeamish during some of the rough spots.



TOWELHEAD

• Written by directed by Alan Ball

• From a novel by Alicia Erian

• Rated R for strong disturbing sexual content and abuse involving a young teen, and for language

• Runtime: 124 minutes

• 4 stars out of 5