Spirituality
and a daughter’s success in the National Spelling Bee figure into this story of
a domineering father (Richard Gere), his wife (Juliette Binoche), and their
children. Some nice visuals don’t make up for a film that never quite gels.
Having
not read the Myla Goldberg novel on which Bee Season is based, I
expected it to be a cross between Searching for Bobby Fischer and the
superb documentary Spellbound, a story about a father and a gifted
child. While a daughter’s success in the National Spelling Bee is a major part
of the story, it’s actually more like The Squid and the Whale, in that
the father (Richard Gere) is a university professor who seems oblivious to his
influence on the rest of his family, and the story is about the family dynamic.
His wife (Juliette Binoche) and son are having different kinds of spiritual
crises. He’s a rock-solid Kabalah man. Bee Season seems to be getting
more of a marketing push than Squid and the Whale, but its characters
are less sharply etched and its story less convincing. To me, a spelling bee is
an odd vehicle for a film that’s in part about spirituality. I had trouble
believing that even a self-absorbed, spiritually-minded guy would use the weird
anagram and meditation techniques to help with spelling, a task of
memorization. The act of rebellion that ends the film is also unconvincing.
Directed by the duo who made The Deep End (an excellent psychological
suspense film), Bee Season has some compelling visuals. The smug father
role plays to Gere’s strength, and neophyte Flora Cross is very natural as the
daughter. However, any of the above films are more absorbing.
circulated via email 11/24/05 and posted 9/21/13
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