12 and Holding (2006)

Image credit: Twelve and Holding: Julia Griner

(FROM LEFT) '12''S Connor Donovan, Zoe Weizenbaum, and Jesse Camacho

Five years after his feature debut, L.I.E., with its molten core of suburban pedophilia, director Michael Cuesta returns to the world of dangers for preteens in nice houses with 12 and Holding. And this second visit, with its insistence on extremes of sexuality, violence, and cartoon obesity (an adolescent girl with a crush on a grown man dresses like a Desperate Housewife; the acts of bullies lead to tragedy; a fat kid resents his even fatter parents), makes Cuesta's interest seem more obsessive than artistically daring. The young cast is terrific, giving the stories unearned weight.