Director's projects share dark themes

"My therapist looks at me and says, 'What is it with you? Why do you have to go to these dark places?' " laughs director-writer Michael Cuesta, who has only made two feature films, but they are enough to earn his head doctor's concern.

In 2001, he made an eye-opening debut with L.I.E. (Long Island Expressway), about a young boy taken under the wing of a 55-year-old molester. That led writer-producer Alan Ball to offer Cuesta a job directing a handful of episodes of the death-obsessed Six Feet Under. And now Cuesta returns with his second film, a challenging tale of children and parents gone awry, 12 and Holding.

Universal Pictures Read reviews of "12 and Holding."

Despite the similarities in his projects so far, Cuesta says, "I don't consciously search for anything in particular. It's what grabs me and I just react to intuitively. No, there's no decision that I'm going to go out there and make another movie about adolescence."

Still, New York-born Cuesta, 42, has a strong identification with his characters. "I think they're all me. I hope they're all kids. In a way, I identified with the part of the parents that are kind of wrapped up in their own problems. I have two kids."

Although 12 and Holding is R-rated, Cuesta feels that his 11-year-old son Emilio is capable of seeing it. "Is he old enough? If he's a mature 11 and has a parent that is going to take the time to say, 'Whadya think of that?' and just sort of be a sounding board for him, I think that it's OK."

Cuesta can recall being Emilio's age and seeing just such a life-transforming movie. "I was 11, maybe even younger, when I saw Clockwork Orange," the Stanley Kubrick film about a futuristic, violent society. "My father took me to see that, but he hung out with me and talked with me about it. I remember it made quite a strange impression on me. Probably made me want to make movies."

Both of Cuesta's films have called for complex, emotional performances from young actors. The secret of getting such work from them is "making sure you nail it in the casting process," he explains. "At that moment, you'd better be making a right decision. What you see in the casting room is pretty much what you're going to get on the set."

One plot thread in 12 and Holding involves a young girl who becomes fixated on a construction worker, seeing him as a father figure. Its impact is heightened by an awareness of Cuesta's earlier film. "Every time they are together, there is this sense of dread and impending doom, because you're not sure where that's going to go," he says. "Plus because of L.I.E., I guess everyone assumes that I'm going to have a pedophile in the movie again."

Despite audience reactions to his films, Cuesta says, "I don't see them as dark. I just don't see it that way. And besides, if you don't go to that difficult place, how to you learn, how do you heal?"