Pariah is one of those indy stories that needs telling, as it carries an important emotional and social heft to it. Cropping up earlier this year in film festivals such as Sundance, Pariah is the story of a young girl living in inner city New York, who has a tough time dealing with her sexuality around her over-protective and opinionated parents. The feature film debut of Dee Rees, she struggles at times to convey a strong enough message, making some directorial mistakes. But thanks to strong main performances, the film is not entirely lost.

We meet Alike, played wonderfully by the relative newcomer Adepero Oduye, as a Brooklyn teenager dealing with an identity crisis as she’s afraid of expressing her sexuality around her parents, who insist upon her wearing “proper” woman’s clothes, encourage her to try to meet boys, and are completely oblivious to her needs and wants, particularly surrounding her sexual identity.

The story is relatively simple, following her heartbreak, redemption, and continued sufferings due to her family and personal struggles, and her relationships with friends, some of whom understand her better than others. All the while, she can express her frustration, light, and feeling through her gift of poetry.

Pariah is a bit scrambled as a film, Rees makes the mistake of spreading an already short film too thin. Focusing too heavily on the domestic issues of Alike’s parents (played by Nina Daniels and Charles Parnell), who, when it comes down to it, don’t matter nearly as much to the plot as does Alike’s inner development, which when present, shine through film. Additionally, Alike’s unique relationship with a teacher, played by Zabryna Guevara, who mentors her in both poetry and self-expression is hardly given attention, despite being one of the most important elements of the film.

The film ends up faltering not to its constraints, as it had a terrific lead and important voice in Alike. The issue is that with what should (and more importantly could) have been a truly devastating and emotionally rich film, instead it feels incomplete in the realization of its message. The emotional heft simply leaves something to be desired. Considering the subject matter and acting abilities clearly present, the film felt too safe as it didn’t delve fully enough or truly embrace the situation facing Alike, as a young gay woman in a religious, prejudice-filled environment.

While ultimately Pariah disappoints a little too much, there are many strong points – specifically the amazing performance by Adepero Oduye, which was able to salvage the film from being too frayed to follow. Also helping the film was a very satisfyingly accurate ending which greatly serves those moments in the film that shine, providing for an ending experience much stronger than the eighty or so minutes that precede it.

Pariah was reviewed as part of The Mill Valley Film Festival, an annual event which is “a celebration of the best in independent and world cinema, MVFF brings together a community of filmmakers and film lovers in Mill Valley, San Rafael and beyond to experience amazing new films in the beautiful environment of San Francisco’s Bay Area.”

Grade: C+

Rated: R (for sexual content and language.)

Pariah opens in limited release December 28.