While Whitney and me were visiting her family in Norman, we had a free afternoon and came across this film. I remembered it coming out, but it seemed to come and go.Adapted from the popular novel and set during the Civil Rights moments, it follows Lily (Dakota Fanning), a teenage girl who runs away from her strict father (the always good Paul Bettany) and the guilt she carries about the loss of her mom. Alongside her only friend and housekeeper (Jennifer Hudson), they stumble across a bee farm run by African-American sisters. These women take in Lily as she starts to discover her true roots and tries to figure out more about her painful past.
Although I’ve never read the book, this film seemed very true to its original source. It definitely plays out like a novel, and it was just a bit too slow for me. The performances and story are good all around, but it just wasn’t my taste. That being said, I would recommend it to a lot of people who I thought it might appeal to, which leans more to a female demographic. Like a good book, it’s full of sad and happy moments, but for one of the rare times, I would have rather spent my time reading the book. I think I would have been a bit more invested into the characters and I would have liked to taken in the story at my own pace.
I give The Secret Lives of Bees 3 out of 5 grits.
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