Permanent

The film is set in the early 1980s in small town Virginia. Aurelie is the new girl in town, having recently relocated from Washington D.C. with her parents Jim (a former steward for Air Force One) and Jeanne. Jim is attending college on a scholarship to become a physician while Jeanne, now the breadwinner, works at the local chicken shack. Aurelie asks her parents if she can have a permanent to fit in with the "Farrah Fawcett" types in town. Her parents finally relent and take her to a local beauty school to get her hair processed at a discount. The result is disastrous, making Aurelie look more like orphan Annie than Farrah. She starts school and is immediately teased by everyone. She tries to befriend the only black girl in school, Lydia, but is rebuffed. Aurelie furthers her unpopularity by overly participating in class and is frequently bullied by a group of popular girls. Aurelie reluctantly takes a karate class in order to defend herself. She sees a sign on another beauty shop in town that advertises permanent fixes for $60 and resolves to make the money. Eventually the school holds a poetry reading contest, with a top prize of $75. Aurelie signs up herself and Lydia. Lydia initially does not want to participate. During the poetry contest she panics and recites the lyrics to "Feeling Good" instead of her assigned poem. Meanwhile, Aurelie is confronted by the popular girls. She uses her karate training to defeat the girls and returns to the contest to see that Lydia has been announced the winner. Lydia offers Aurelie the money to fix her hair, and Aurelie declines saying that she no longer cares.