Vicky Brien on Bend it Like Beckham

In our forth lecture we analysed the film Bend It Like Beckham and looked at how the film deals with issues of race, gender and identity, bringing in theories of hybridity, post – colonialism and the idea of the ‘third space’.
The film focuses on a British girl, Jess and her struggle to fulfil her ambition of being a professional footballer. We see her clash with her family, who represent a more traditional outlook. Jess’s character is very different and extremely unconventional compared to the rest of her family; we see how British culture has almost shaped her character and how her identity is ever changing throughout the film due to these influences.
The film explores this idea of cultural collision and how this creates a sense of double identity, or how Homi K. Bhabha calls – ‘Third Space’.
‘An ambivalent space of enunciation’ this idea explores how identity or culture is constantly being constructed therefore identity can never be fixed.
This is typical of the character Jess who, despite of her traditional upbringing insists on playing football and integrating more into British culture, where its seems that she is able to explore and enjoy her own identity more.
The character of Jess represents a more modern and perhaps positive outlook on identity, her character is willing to change and integrate with other cultures, whilst her family especially her parents seem more traditional and are un willing to break away from that tradition, in this sense we get an overview of ‘both sides’ of the family.
The film also focuses on the idea of gender and how it seems to be as transparent as identity. The character of jess and her friend Jules or Juliette challenges typical female stereotypes by playing football and dressing quite ‘boyish’, in contrast to Jess’s sister, who is very glamorous and quite traditional (we see her at the end of the film pregnant).
This type of film break’s away from the more traditional roles of femininity, such as housewife and mothers.
Overall the film has broken away from the more traditional British heritage films and created a new hybrid of films – Brasian (a mix of British and Asian) and focuses on more modern ideas of hybridity and cultural identity. This post-colonial film helps us analyse modern society and how culture and identity are ever changing and never fixed.