Think of an extended “El Norte” remixed with a bit of “Crash” and “Babel,” and you get an idea of what to expect from “Crossing Over.” It’s an unabashedly complicated story about an undeniably complicated subject.

And while the film stars heavyweight Hollywood actors such as Harrison Ford, Ray Liotta and Ashley Judd, the most complicated role falls to up-and-coming actress Summer Bishil. She plays Taslima Jahangir, a 15-year-old Middle Eastern immigrant trying to fit in at her American high school. But reading aloud an essay that empathizes with the 9/11 attackers doesn’t endear her to her classmates. We checked in with Bishil, 20, by telephone and asked about her challenging role.

Q: Playing a character who says the voices of terrorists were finally heard on 9/11 is heavy stuff. Were you at all reluctant to play the part?

A: I was pretty gung ho to do it and excited to audition for something really dramatic. It’s an acting muscle I enjoy using.

Q: How did you prepare?

A: I read the Quran - the English translation, obviously - and whatever books I could find by scholars who had written on Islam and its impact on the West. I did a lot of research and a lot of reading. I didn’t get too critical about whether or not I learned my lines. Mainly, I had an outline and learned my lines right before we’d shoot, so that it would be more organic.

Q: What did you learn from the research?

A: It made me want to study theology and Islam. I don’t know if I want to study Islam anymore, but I got really into the text reading and it became an interest of mine and it still is one. So I guess I’ll always carry that experience with me.

Q: Did it help you bust any of your own stereotypes?

A: Not really. I grew up with girls who were Muslim. I went to an international school in the Middle East most of my childhood. So I didn’t have any negative stereotypes of Muslims. My father’s family is Muslim.

Q: What about other cultures depicted in the film?

A: It did surprise me about the diversity of the people who go through this immigrant experience and want to come to the United States - just the sheer desire to come here and work. It’s devastating. You read about it in the newspapers, you talk to friends about it, you hear about it when you go to class. But when I read the script, it was so heartbreaking. The stories are real tearjerkers.

Q: Was there a scene that was particularly powerful for you?

A: Yes. Alice Eve’s character. She plays the Australian actress trying to get work in Hollywood without a green card. I thought it was really powerful. Her story was so heartbreaking. It was such a good performance. It really got to me.

Q: You were in the Middle East in September 2001 at the U.S. Department of Defense School in Bahrain. What do you remember from that experience?

A: I had to do a little research on what the sentiment was in America because it was clear where I was. My school shut down for security. I remember for a few days we weren’t at school because of extra security. We went into the highest alert. It was scary. But it was scarier for people in America because that’s where it was happening. I didn’t understand the prejudice that came after. I came (back to the States) a little after, when it died down and wasn’t quite the hysterics anymore.

Q: Did you notice a different America?

A: Well, I came back about a year and half after the 9/11 attacks. I left America when I was 3, though, so I didn’t have an idea of what it was like. When I came back, I was 15. It was the America I was getting to know for the first time. Even though I am American, it was a completely new experience. I don’t remember what it was like before then.

Q: Did you have a personal experience similar to your character’s?

A: I could not have been more different from this character. That’s why I did so much reading, because I did not connect with her personally or instinctively. With other characters I feel it right away and then I do the research. With this character, I didn’t feel anything, and that really scared the hell out of me. So I researched a lot. And her story is based on a true story, so it’s pretty sad.

Q: That speech by Taslima raised quite a few eyebrows and got quite a reaction in the theater when I saw it. Did you wonder how it would be interpreted?

A: I never really thought about what I was saying in the speech from the perspective of how it was going to be perceived because I don’t think the character was thinking about it. But my mom was like, “Oh my gosh. She’s saying some pretty out-there things.” But you know, it’s a view from a 15-year-old girl. I know I said pretty crazy things when I was 15, too.

Q: How was the energy on the set?

A: When the extras had to do their bits, all the outrage from the students, it really hurt me. That wasn’t fake. It hurt when they’d shout … all those awful words.

Q: How many takes were needed?

A: I don’t remember, but it was a long day. One boy in particular was like, “I feel bad saying all these things,” in between takes. And I’d have to say to him, “It’s OK. It’s a movie!”

Q: This film seems to take a stand on immigration. Did it change any of your views?

A: Yes, it did. But I’m pretty liberal, and I think it’s a pretty liberal film. It’s just sad. Immigration is this never-ending debate. One of my friends has a completely different opinion. But I can totally see her opinion, and she can see mine. It’s like, what is right and what is wrong? It could go on forever. How do you debate something that is so personal? It’s so based on the individual. How do you go and make it so impersonal and debate it and make all of these sweeping decisions with so many consequences? That all became more aware to me.

Crossing Over (R) opens Friday at Bay Area theaters.

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Summer Bishil, star of Alan Ball’s Towelhead, is affecting as the Muslim girl whose rash actions tear her family apart.

The surprising success of Crash seems to have encouraged other filmmakers who yearn to make socially conscious ensemble movies. Whereas Crash wove together stories that focused on racial tensions in Los Angeles, Crossing Over brings the same kaleidoscopic technique to the hot-button issue of immigration.

Characters include immigration officers (Harrison Ford and Cliff Curtis) and a medley of immigrants from Iran, Korea, Mexico and Bangladesh. Writer-director Wayne Kramer, who attracted attention with The Cooler a few years ago, came to this country from South Africa, so his interest in the subject is genuine. But the film plays like a garish melodrama that reproduces the most ham-fisted, polemical aspects of Crash. Lightning seems unlikely to strike twice; box-office prospects for the drama, which the Weinstein Co. releases Friday (February 27), are limited.

Rather than taking the low-key, realistic approach that Tom McCarthy brought to The Visitor, Kramer has opted for an overheated style that veers toward soap opera. For example, when Ford’s Max Brogan leads a raid of a dress factory, he arrests a woman who pleads with him to look after her helpless young son. A teenager from Bangladesh arouses the suspicion of the authorities when she presents a school paper defending the 9/11 hijackers. And in one of the loopier episodes, an Australian actress (Alice Eve) desperate for her green card happens to ram her car into a bureaucrat (Ray Liotta) responsible for processing applications; he offers to expedite her papers in exchange for sexual favors, and she joins him for soulless trysts at a seedy motel.

The film is rife with coincidences, and it frequently strains credulity. Kramer contrives the unlikely encounters in order to tug at the audience’s heartstrings, and sometimes he succeeds in forcing a tear or two, but the emotions aren’t honestly earned.

Still, within this hash of lurid confrontations, there are a few effective scenes and strong performances. Ford plays his world-weary role with dignity and compassion, and there’s an uncharacteristically understated — and well-written — scene when he meets the shrewd young sister of his Iranian partner, and sparks fly. Curtis, who has given a series of exceptional performances in such films as Once Were Warriors and Whale Rider, captures the anguish of a man caught between professional and familial loyalty. Summer Bishil, star of Alan Ball’s Towelhead, is affecting as the Muslim girl whose rash actions tear her family apart.

Ashley Judd fares less well as an earnest immigration attorney who happens to be married to the lecherous Liotta. And it’s hard to know what to make of the bizarre comic subplot that features Jim Sturgess (from Across the Universe and 21) as a secular Jewish immigrant trying to pass himself off as an Orthodox rabbinical student.

The film makes good use of some unfamiliar Los Angeles locations, and the editing by Arthur Coburn keeps the interludes flowing briskly. But the slick craftsmanship can’t hide the fact that most of these mini-melodramas are unadulterated hokum.

Source: Reuters

Summer Bishil is nominated for Best Female Lead.

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