Genre: Drama Starring: Angela Bassett, Laurence Fishburne, Keke palmer
Director and Screnwriter: Doug Atchison
For the long time that this movie spent in my laptop unseen I believed
it to be an animation! I was surprised to see that instead it was the
story of a young, bright girl. The movie is very predictable and yet
watchable. You will not mind the 112 minute runtime. For those of us who have seen and loved karate kid movies this would be good timepass. Fishburne’s Dr. Larabee proves a fitting Mr. Miyagi to Akeelah’s Karate Kid.
The movie was released in 2006 and did quite well on the US Box office. It won critical accolade too- 83% rating on rottentomatoes. The film has been heavily promoted by Starbucks as a result of a partnership between Lions Gate Films, 2929 Entertainment, and Starbucks Entertainment. It became the first DVD offered for sale at Starbucks.
The movie follows the path of most underdog goes on to be champion movies. Here the underdog is a young girl named Akeelah who just loves to learn spelling and hates being ridiculed by friends for being so good at it. She is younger, poorer and more shy than most contestants. She hates her school and the principal has to blackmail her into participating in the school bee contest- a contest that is a cakewalk for her. Principal’s friend Mr Larabee(Fishburne) agrees to be her coach and thus starts a wonderful relationship.
As expected Akeelah makes it to the regional and national levels. She fights cheating candidates, her mother’s disapproval and her own demons. Its in the final round when she intentionally makes a mistake to allow Dylan win the championship that an interesting climax follows.
Angela Bassett superbly plays a single mom, secretly mourning her husband and doing her best to bring up her kids. Laurence Fishburne has also turned in an excellent performance. he looks every bit the highly intellectual yet strict professor. It is a well directed movie, even if the story is very predictable the pace and grip on the film makes it watchable.
This movie depends on its young stars and young keke palmer almost carries the movie on her shoulders. Shes fresh and natural, doesnt seem syrupy sweet. Javier and Sean Michael(Daniel Chu) perform well .
Trivia:
Spellbound and Bee Season preceded it were also based on the similar concept.
Keke, Fishburne and Bassett won the best actress, actor in supporting role and actress in supporting role awards at Black Movie awards besides others
This is Laurence Fishburne’s and Angela Bassett’s 3rd film together.
They also starred in What’s Love Got to Do With it and Boyz in the Hood.
- Many Indian born kids have won the contest
5.
The final word spelled by Dylan is logorrhea. This is the winning word from the documentary Spellbound