"Akeelah" squashed

By Benjamin Baxter
The Collegian

It almost seems appropriate that a family-oriented drama would follow in the wake of the success of “Spellbound,” a documentary that focused on the inherent and personal drama of the National Spelling Bee. It is a move that is almost as predictable as most family movies; it’s almost begging to be adapted into a feel-good drama.

In “Akeelah and the Bee” there’s a child protagonist in a position of authority, high drama between high-powered players at the highest levels and the essential conflict that arises from both.

Akeelah (Keke Palmer) has inwardly felt as neglected and out-of-touch since her father’s death. She’s bullied around for being too smart, but is talked into competing in the school spelling bee when she is given the alternative of detention for her lax academic work by Principal Welch (Curtis Armstrong).

Welch is trying to get some good publicity for his school as it’s suffering from poor test scores, one of the many undeveloped plot threads. Nonetheless, he enlists sabbatical UCLA English professor Dr. Larabee, (the ever-stoic Laurence Fishburne) to help Akeelah study her way to a championship.

With the exception of Akeelah’s mother (Angela Basset), Akeelah’s family and friends are little more than background noise. They offer guidance and comic relief one throwaway line at a time.

The admittedly touching relationships Akeelah builds with her friends and enemies are undermined by the way she speeds through them. The requisite clever banter between her acquaintances is full-on strong in the film, but without depth, these secondary characters just fill up minutes.

Like most family films, “Akeelah” errs on the side of formulaic and predictable.

“Akeelah” is almost clever enough that one might laud it as being as a step away from that direction, but the flavor of the movie is made too bland by filling it with the stock characters who function solely as plot devices. Her hecklers at the school spelling bee are strangely and suddenly supportive by the time the end of the film rolls around.

Had “Akeelah” taken as many chances as the title character it would have had fewer Original-Lifetime-Presentation qualities.

Akeelah may mean “intelligent” in Arabic, but with the movie as it stands it might as well mean “wasted opportunities.” It’s a spelling bee minus the unpredictable quality, and that’s the worst kind, even if there are still more than a few moments that stand out as clever and interesting. Moments do not make a good movie.

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