Our teenage years are all about drama. Under the right circumstances, a stolen glance across the cafeteria could be as tragic and dramatic as the entirety of “Anna Karenina”. Our home lives? Enough to make us beat our tear at our bosom and wail. It might not be the whole world, but it can seem that way when we just want to get to the truth of who we are.

Hala (Geraldine Viswanathan) is a Muslim teenager in her senior year at an American high school. It’s immediately apparent that she seeks a balance between tradition and modernity as a Muslim American; she wears a hijab outside her home, but her favorite mode of transportation is her skateboard. She is close to her parents, but evidently more-so with her father (Azad Khan). He seems more willing to bend the rules of tradition, and to Hala, his level of education seems a closer match to her own. Hala soon meets a white boy named Jesse (Jack Kilmer), and her notions of tradition and propriety are further challenged. What Hala doesn’t know is that her feelings for Jesse aren’t what will challenge her understandings and beliefs – he is just the first domino to fall.

This isn’t a film not only interested in “what”, but especially interested in “how”. The film is scored and rendered with swirls of classic melodrama, as if director Minhal Baig continually asked herself “How would Douglas Sirk Do It?”. The effect is classic; squint just-so and Hala could be trading poetic passages with Jesse in a deleted scene from ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS. The approach is poetic and stunning. It reminds us that this modern story is one fuelled by struggles that have plagued women like Hala for generations.

This is a story that is deeply personal. Every bit of it comes from HALA’s perspective, whether it’s the secrets she uncovers or the experiences she gains. We fall as she falls, rise as she rises. It’s rare that a film is told in such a singular voice: HALA uses that voice with true clarity. 

Without getting into specifics, HALA has several moments where the Baig’s point of view allows for added weight. There are gestures, looks, and words in this film that are rare within the landscape of cinema. Each of them go a long way to underscore Hala’s perspective – which is likely a perspective so many girls like her have seldom seen on-screen.

HALA is a story in search of the truth. It gets to the core of who we are, and who we grow-up believing ourselves to be. When we go through a journey like Hala does over the course of this film, the truth seems to change from minute-to-minute. The challenge is making heads-or-tails of the world as it is, and then approaching it with honesty…following the path wherever it may lead.