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Poster (c) Fox Searchlight
Although it most definitely will be compared to My Big Fat Greek Wedding, it really shouldn’t be. Even though both of them have a young person rebelling against their orthodox parents, Greek Wedding is a nice little slapstick romantic comedy blockbuster. Bend It Like Beckham isn’t as much slapstick, but better in most every way, except it isn’t as funny, and it’s looking to be the next indie-blockbuster, which it shouldn’t.
Jesminder “Jess” Bhamara (Parminder Nagra, in a very good debut) lives with her mother (Shaheen Khan), father (Anupam Kher, star of over 100 Bollywood movies), and sister Pinky (Archie Panjabi) in England. She’s a good football player (that’s also called soccer), and she often plays with boys in the park, and she always beats them. One day, Juliet “Jules” Paxton (Keira Knightley) approaches her and asks her to play for the only women’s team in England.
She has to avoid her parents, because they don’t want her to play sports, they want her to do housework, then marry a man and live a normal Indian life. Jess sneaks out of her house and pretends to be going to work. Meanwhile, Pinky is getting married. Much to Jess’s dismay, her parents find out and Pinky’s marriage is called off, because Jess is a disgrace to her family. Also, Jess loves famous British football star David Beckham, and has a crush on her coach, Joe (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers).
Bend It Like Beckham is a fulfilling and “winning comedy”, as one tagline says. It had depth in the characters (unlike Greek Wedding, which just throws characters in). We got to care about them, and wanted to learn more about them. At many times I laughed, but it seemed to have too many serious and slow points without comedy in it. Although it had a more serous side than Greek Wedding, it didn’t have to go that far.
The cinematography at times was very good. It was spinning many times and was on a crane many times. One especially cool shot was during a match, when it was a first person view from a football. The music was very good, also. Something else that was good was the acting. Nagra gives a great debut, and she should be in more movies as the years go by. Knightley, who looked very sexy throughout the movie, did a performance that I didn’t know was possible in movies like this. Kher and Khan were very funny, and I believed everyone for what they were in the movie. I would recommend Bend It Like Beckham if you like comedies that are both funny and poignant.
Rated PG-13 for language and sexual content.
Review Date: May 3, 2003