obsession boyfriend i'm psyched     i'm dreading enemy

(need an explanation?)

advertisements


Bend It Like Beckham (review)

It's completely predictable and predictably feel-good, but so damn what? This is an utterly delightful flick, not for the least which reason is that it's about complex, engaging, and realistically flawed young women devoting their lives to something more ambitious than chasing boys and buying cosmetics. London teenage Jesminder (Parminder K. Nagra) lives in a schizophrenic world, overprotected and bound by the cultural expectations of her strict Indian parents (Anupam Kher and Shaheen Khan) on one side, and tempted by the almost unrestricted possibilities offered by the English culture she grew up in on the other. Mom and Dad tolerate her obsession with football (soccer to us Yanks) in general and superstar David Beckham in particular by assuming it's a silly affectation that will disappear once they decide it's time for her to get married. But when Jess discovers that there are actually girls' football teams that play in competition -- and that it's not impossible for someone with her talent to play professionally -- things get stickier for her. Will Mom and Dad come around in the end? Of course they will, but getting there is fraught with angst of all kinds, from threats to her sister Pinky's (Archie Panjabi) upcoming marriage by her future in-laws, who disapprove of Jess's unfeminine and undemure hobby, to Jess's complicated relationship with her Irish coach, Joe (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers: Ride with the Devil), taboo for more reasons than one. But even her Anglo pals don't have things so easy: Jules (Keira Knightley) butts heads with her mother (Juliet Stevenson: Nicholas Nickleby) over the proper behavior for girls, too. It's cross-cultural! It's sporting! It's My Big Fat Indian Football Match! It's a good night at the movies. Don't miss it.


more below the ad... scroll down...


viewed at a private screening with an audience of critics
rated PG-13 for language and sexual content
official site | IMDB

who I am


I'm MaryAnn Johanson: writer and ponderer in New York City who drinks too much wine and thinks way too much about such inconsequences as movies, TV, books, and the meaning of life.
[email me]

• contributor, Film.com
• member, Online Film Critics Society
• member, Alliance of Women Film Journalists
• member, International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences
• visit my scratchpad blog, MaryAnnJohanson.com
• read my Doctor Who fan fiction

photo by David Speranza

(postings feed)

Add to Technorati Favorites

monthly archives

recent screenings and hot movies

just opened
green for go Hancock
green for go Kit Kittredge: An American Girl
box office top 5
green for go Wall-E
green for go Wanted
yellow for maybe Get Smart
green for go Kung Fu Panda
green for go The Incredible Hulk
top limited releases
green for go Mongol
green for go The Visitor
When Did You Last See Your Father?
green for go Kit Kittredge: An American Girl
Then She Found Me
coming soon
green for go Man on Wire
yellow for maybe Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D
red for no Harold
yellow for maybe Hellboy II: The Golden Army
yellow for maybe Diminished Capacity
red for no Fly Me to the Moon
yellow for maybe A Thousand Years of Good Prayers
yellow for maybe The Wackness
now playing
red for no The Love Guru
red for no The Happening
yellow for maybe You Don't Mess With the Zohan
green for go Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
green for go The Fall
green for go Young@Heart
yellow for maybe Quid Pro Quo
red for no Sex and the City: The Movie
red for no The Strangers
green for go Dreams With Sharp Teeth
green for go Iron Man
green for go The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian

2008 screening log

advertisements

search

Google
flickfilosopher.com
web
Powered by
Movable Type 3.36