I’ve been aware of this movie basically as long as it’s been around, but I’d never seen it until now. Despite one major caveat that hampered my enjoyment a little, it’s a fun film about sports, family, culture, and growing up.
(Side note: because this is a British movie, I’ll say “football” instead of “soccer.” It’s only right.)
Jess adores football. Watching it, playing it—you name it, she’s there. When a girl named Jules sees her playing in the park, she invites her to try out for a real team. Soon, she’s playing competitively for the first time and dreaming of football scholarships and pro women’s teams in the U.S. The only problem? Her parents don’t think it’s “appropriate” for her to play football and she doesn’t know how to tell them she’s on the team.
Like most stories about girls/women in sports, Jess and Jules have to put up with some annoying sexism from dudes who won’t take them seriously as athletes, and like most stories about kids navigating their relationship with their immigrant parents, Jess’s interests and dreams are out of sync with the future her parents are laying out for her, and she feels like she’s being stifled by them. However, in both cases, the film takes a somewhat more nuanced approach to these more typical themes. On the whole, Jules and Jess have no time for tired sexism and are way more focused on being awesome on the pitch than worrying about what stupid guys say about them. And while Jess’s mom worries about Jess playing football “half naked” (i.e., wearing shorts) and thinks she should focus more on becoming wife material, Jules’s mom disapproves of Jules’s athleticism too, concerned Jules won’t find a boy to like her if she doesn’t dress up and only thinks about football. So it’s less about “immigrant parents who don’t understand their kids” and more “all parents can struggle to understand their kids, and culture can be part of that.”
The part of the film that gives me pause is the dynamic with Joe, the team’s coach. It doesn’t take long to realize that both Jess and Jules have crushes on him, which is perfectly understandable. Where it gets dicey is when it becomes clear that he may be into Jess as well. My discomfort made me preoccupied with gauging how old Jess is, and even though it seems she’s 18 (it’s the summer after she’s completed sixth form) and her mom has been trying to get her to think about getting married, it’s still a shaky dynamic. It’s unclear exactly how old Joe is supposed to be, but he definitely reads as an adult while Jess and Jules read as teens—not to mention, regardless of their ages, he’s still her coach! At the same time, any age difference or imbalanced power dynamic is barely mentioned as an issue. The movie takes steps to make it less problematic than it could have been, but it still bothers me.
Pretty much everything else, though, I like. I like that both Jess and Jules’s parents get a little more shading as the film goes on, with it evident that, on both sides, the parents love their daughter and are rather misguidedly trying to do what they think is best for her. I love watching Jules and Jess’s growing friendship (their outing to buy cleats/boots for Jess is adorable,) and I like that Jess isn’t embarrassed or insecure about being Indian. I enjoy the gossiping flock of aunties who always turn up at the most inopportune moments, and the music is really fun.
Parminder Nagra is really engaging and rootable as Jess. She’s flawed and can do some dumb things, but she’s also a good kid who’s figuring out how to be her own person. Keira Knightley does a great job with Jules—despite some occasional “stroppiness,” I love her passion for football and the pure joy of her friendship with Jess. My feelings on the Joe plotline notwithstanding, Jonathan Rhys Meyers plays it well. I also recognize Juliet Stevenson as Jules’s mom—she played the intolerable Mrs. Elton in the Gwyneth Paltrow/Jeremy Northam Emma.
Warnings
Language (including sexist insults and a racial slur,) sexual content/references, drinking, thematic elements, and uncomfortable romance dynamics.
No comments:
Post a Comment