Sunday 16 January 2005

Bend It Like Beckham (2002) - ickleReview (DVD)

Jess (Parminda Nagra) is a British Indian Sikh girl who is good at football and talks to the David Beckham posters above her bed. One day, a white girl called Jules (Keira Knightley) sees her playing with the boys in the park and invites her to try out for her girls' team, Hounslow Harriers, coached by a young Irishman (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers), who can't play himself because of a serious knee injury. The rather predictable feel-good plot probes almost every diversity issue you could think of: from inter-racial marriage, to homosexuality; to cultural hybridism and women's liberation. It's all good fun, and Nagra and Knightley provide some wonderful eye candy.

The football action sequences are a little actorish and the plot arc more than a little familiar. I don't know if these films help to dispell stereotypes or merely reinforce them. Probably just a harmless evening's entertainment.

Nugget: I've seen this movie so many times before, even though it was the first time I've seen it, if you see what I mean.

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