It looks like Beckham is the most famous football player in UK. I didn’t know. I’m not exactly the average italian soccer entusiast. Anyway, Jess (Parminder Nagra) is an indian young girl living in London and dreaming to become a football player. Beckham is her hero. She meets Jules (Keira Knighley) who plays football in a local team. Jess joins the team, but her parents are very upset. Indian traditions are strict and girls are not allowed to wear short pants and play soccer. They should marry and cook dinner. Jess is even frustrated by her sister who’s going to get married in a big fat huge traditional wedding.

This is the first Bollywood movie I happen to watch. It’s a playful comedy but talks about racial integration, sex discrimination (since they are girls, everybody tries to stop them on the path to success, they are misbelieved as lesbian, they have a gay friend), surpassed traditions, generation gap and how hard it is for youngsters to choose their future life in spite of their parents thinking they know better. And of course there is the mandatory romantic love story with the team coach. Enjoyable, lots of fun.

Bend it like Beckam,
UK 2002, by Gurinder Chada, Comedy
with Parminder Nagra, Keira Knightley, Jonathan Rhys Meyers
IMDB 286499