Spellbound....h-i-l-a-r-i-o-u-s

I rewatched Spellbound this weekend, and I must say, it was much funnier the second time around. The filmmakers did an excellent job at picking personalities and representing sterotypes. My favorite part was meeting the families. There's the girl whose parents are illegals from Mexico and don't even speak any English; the Indian girl who studies constantly and plays the violin; the rich white girl who actually hates spelling and only does it because she wasn't the best at singing or riding horse, who was upset because her family didn't bring the au pair to the bee; the outcast boy that lives in the sticks (and won his regional bee because the other boy started to spell mayonnaise with an "a"); the rich Indian boy with the psychotic parents (Latin, French, and Spanish tutors) who was shown doing military style pushups, and who I'm sure was severely flogged after he got out of the bee (just as he will be when he only finishes 3rd in his class at Harvard medical school); the girl with the completely unaware parents ("my stationary says 'bee happy', with two e's!") who descibes her other hobbies as riding roller coasters, being vegetarian, and drinking coffee; the black girl from inner city DC; and of course, Harry "does-this-sound-like-a-musical-robot" Altman, ADD poster child.

My second favorite thing about Spellbound is the times it subtley shows spelling mistakes the adults make (a sign outside a restaurant, one child corrects her teacher). And the third is hearing from the past champions (especially the guy who says winning the bee didn't do much for his love life).

The lengths the kids go to are fairly scary. Having language tutors and reading the dictionary were not my ideas of fun as a child. Sometimes it's hard to see how much of the desire is the child's and how my is the parents', but a lot of the kids express relief when they get out or once they get too old for the bee. Either way I love this documentary. The bee sounds boring, but it's really nerve racking (I've found myself watching it on ESPN), and the back stories are really what makes it interesting.