Towelhead

[Kurosawa Fan]

Trailer (http://www.apple.com/trailers/warner_independent_pictures/towlhead/trailer/)

Not to be outdone by Baghead.

[megladon8]

I got this one mixed up with Baghead when I made the thread, and originally said something about Aaron Eckhart :crazy:

I think this looks all right, thought it may be trying a little too hard to "push buttons".

[megladon8]

From IMDb...


Muslims Outraged Over 'Towelhead' Title

25 August 2008 6:32 PM, PDT

Muslim leaders are urging movie executives at Warner Bros. to retitle their new movie Towelhead because the word is "offensive and exploitative".

Los Angeles members of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (Cair) insist the derogatory term is offensive to American Muslims and Arab-Americans. They go so far as to state the term 'towelhead' as "a racial and religious slur".

In a letter sent to studio executives, the Islamic civil rights and advocacy group has asked that the film, directed by Alan Ball, be called Nothing is Private - a title previously used in some markets.

Cair-la Executive Director Hussam Ayloush writes, "The word is commonly used in a derogatory manner against people of the Muslim faith or Arab origin... We have no desire to inhibit the creative process or your right to produce any film you wish. However, I ask you to take the above concerns into consideration and examine the social implications of releasing the film under its current title.

"It is unfortunate that a major film studio would choose to exploit an ethnic slur as a sensational promotion for a movie. Mainstreaming a bigoted term in this manner will only serve to legitimize and normalize anti-Muslim prejudice in our society."

The film, starring Aaron Eckhart, Summer Bishil and Toni Collette, is adapted from Alicia Erian's novel about a young Arab-American girl's struggles with life and sexual obsession. The heroine of Erian's story is dubbed 'Towelhead' by some ignorant and bigoted Americans.


So in other words, the title is doing exactly what the studio wanted it to.

And they laugh all the way to the bank...

[Raiders]

This was bad. I suppose Ball was looking for some connection between our prejudices and our differences and the way they come through in our sexual impulses (kind of how sex is an emotional process filtered through levels of social consciousness), but his film is reductive as all get out. His attempts at humor usually rely in some way on a preconceived prejudice or racial/sexual notion and his insight into actual suburbia pretty much zero (which may be why he chose to set the film in the 80s--to avoid having to actually confront these issues in today's society). By the time we arrive at the end and Ball leaves us with a father and daughter witnessing an act of raw humanity that confronts both of their drawbacks (his: sexism, hers: sexuality), it's as if the film is now attempting to do all the work for its characters by making a leap in catharsis that the rest of the sloggish film cannot uphold.

Unfunny and uninsightful. An ultimately useless film.

[number8]

My interview with Alan Ball (http://www.justpressplay.net/movies/movie-news/4021-one-on-one-with-alan-ball-on-qtowelheadq.html)