Tuesday 12 May 2020

'Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure'

Akeelah and the Bee | Film

Yet another delightful treat, a visual one this time, on a child prodigy again, but with an unexpected turn and a twiddle towards the end!

Well, eleven-year old Akeelah is a seventh grader at a black middle school.

Her dad having passed away when she was just six, her mom Tanya works as a nurse to make ends meet.

Akeelah is often mocked at, in school, and hence feels a loner all along!

However, one of her teachers notices that Akeelah has an exceptional talent on her – a unique gift for spelling out even hard words quite effortlessly. Soon, even her school principal gets to know about Akeelah’s talent, and encourages her to participate in the spell champs to win laurels for their school!


But...! the only thing that prevents Akeelah from giving her best on her Spelling talent, is her morbid fear of the people around her – her school mates, and her community mentality where people don’t bother about each other at any point of time!

However, her elder brother Devon encourages her skyhigh on her talent –

- Hey, your principal called Mama. Said you did real good in the spelling bee last week. He said you got a lot of them right. He also said you’ve got an opportunity to go to an even bigger contest next week.

I don’t want to do it.

- Why not?

Everybody’s gonna be looking at me and there’s gonna be tons of words I don’t know.

- So you’re scared, huh?

I mean, my whoIe body said ‘Don’t do it!’.

- But sometimes your brain gotta be smarter than your body, you know?

But I don’t like my school. I don’t see why I gotta do anything for them.

- Then do it for Dad. I mean, you know how he was about words. He’d have loved to see you do something like this.

Well, maybe I should just give up now.

- No no no. No, I’m just saying you need to train hard. With Dr. Larabee.

What? I don’t need any help from him. I could do this on my own.

- Akeelah, the best spellers in the world have coaches. I finally got him to consider taking some time during his sabbatical to work with you. Please, just talk with him. Here. He doesn’t live far from here.

As a result, Akeelah gets to meet up with Professor Larabee, a former Spell Bee champ himself –

 What wouId you like to be when you grow up? A doctor, a lawyer, a standup comic?

- I don’t know. The only thing I’m good at is spelling.

Go over there and read the quotation that’s on the wall. Read it aloud please.

‘Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. We ask ourselves ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?’

‘Actually, who are you not to be? We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us’.

‘And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same’.

And this is the mantra that she regularly says, all to herself almost every day in and day out before and after her coaching on the spelling front!

As a result, quite soon, there’s a transformation wrought within her.

Now, Akeelah the timid kid all of seventh grade, gets to relate well with her professor-coach, her teachers, her classmates, and her community people as well, quite effortlessly and with such joy!

Even her own street kids start cheering for her, after she’s won a few spell bees.

Her coach Dr. Larabee, invests a lot of quality time on her.

He not only teaches her the nuances of words, etymologies, mnemonic skills etc, but also motivates her all the way!

However, one fine day, ahead of the final competition, her coach tells her that he is quitting being her coach as she quite reminds him of his daughter Denise who had died a while ago. But he gives her the bestest tips along with a huge 5000 flashcards to study hard.

You - you’ve got it all, Akeelah. You’ve got word construction down etymology, memorization techniques. What you need to do now is just focus on the words.

I can’t learn 5,000 new words all by myseIf.

Oh, yes, you can.

You’ve got a brain like a sponge. You just sit down and you study them.

- Dr. Larabee, I swear, I promise I won’t miss any more sessions and I’ll do whatever you say. You can’t stop coaching me now.

I toId Mr. WeIch I’d get you through the regionals and I’ve done that. Now, I don’t have anything else I can teach you. You need to just take those words and study them and you’ll be all right.

This is why I was at the mall. Merry Christmas.

A dejected Akeelah now loses all her hope of making it to the finals, without her coach to guide her on her way!

At this juncture, her mother now steps in confident, and encourages her to be cool, calm and confident and go boldly ahead!

[Interestingly, in the initial stages, her mom was all up against Akeelah participating in the Spell Bee event, in the past; But now, she’s so happy with her daughter that she roots rocksolid for her, encouraging her al the while!]

You know, Akeelah, you ain’t short on people who want to help you. I bet if you just look around, you got 50,000 coaches. Starting with me.

Now, true to her mother’s words of encouragement, all of a sudden, Akeelah is overwhelmed to find the whole townsfolk encouraging her and cheering her up all the way!

Endearing in especial, is the local drug dealer’s gesture towards Akeelah. He not only shares word that he had once won a contest in grade school for writing a poem, but he also helps her prepare for the contest in right earnest along with his rugged gang!

And, quite fortunately, before the grand finale, she gets to reunite with her guru Larabee and together they all go to Washington DC for the finals!

[Interestingly, Akeelah isn’t even aware that it was Dr. Larabee who had paid for all four of her family’s air tickets]

At the finals, Akeelah is an instant hit with the crowds.


She’s cheered hard and long by almost everyone in the audience.

And after everyone else is eliminated in the finals, only Dylan Chiu and Akeelah remained in contention for the top slot!

[Dylan Chiu, the Chinese American boy, has had a previous bout with Akeelah at the Spell Bee too, when she witnessed Chiu’s father mounting parental pressure on him to win at any cost!]

That makes up the last two on the contest – Chiu and Akeelah - to clinch the decider!

And now they are given a little break!

During this relax-break, Akeelah overhears Chiu’s father pressurizing him in a very harsh manner, to win the Champs by all means!

But right here, at this very crucial juncture, in her do-or-die bout with the Bee, Akeelah tends to empathise with the pathetic predicament of Chiu! Her heart goes out for him, as he looked every bit nervous, and very much pressurized to perform!

Hence she resolves to lose from then on, quite deliberately to help out her pal Chiu!


Ironically, even Chiu is so fed up with his father’s tyrannical threats on him to win the Bee at any cost, that he deliberately misspells his round, to express his strong resentment and indignation!

Chiu then tells Akeelah that he wants a fair competition at the Bee from then on!

That’s when the two decide between themselves to spell every word given by the judges, until…

the two of them are finally declared co-champions of the Spell Bee!!!


A film with such a positive message bubbling through every shot and every scene!

I very very highly recommend this movie, especially for parents, school teachers and school principals, and obviously for school children as well! ;-)

In a society that’s so obsessed with the term, ‘winning’, this film is such a feel-good movie that shows us worlds out there outside the winners’ commune as well!

Added, the entire film hinges on this little girl Akeelah who quite carries forward the entire movie with such grace and elan!

A very motivational movie especially for the younger generation, to help them understand that, there’s much more to life and living than just winning!

And this positive attitude helps her evolve beautifully from being a loner, to a person who’s loved, cherished and admired by the entire community!

And her final lines carry such a lovely feel to them –

Here goes Akeelah -

That’s what I’m talking about! Where everything feels right?

Where you don’t have to worry about tomorrow or yesterday, but you feel safe and know you’re doing the best you can?

There’s a word for that feeling. It’s called love.

L- O-V-E.

And it’s what I feel for all my family, and all my coaches in my neighborhood, where I come from, where I learned how to spell.

We did it. Write it down a thousand times. The Four-letter word that makes me cry
How I feel about it I can’t decide!

So, World, ready or not, Here I go! Searching for the answer! And I’m not gonna stop! TiII I find where it lingers inside me!

Therein lies the beauty of the ‘Bee!’

Akeelah and the Bee!!