Starring: Lupita Nyong’o, David Oyelowo, Madina Nalwanga etc.
Dir by Mira Nair.
Rating: ****
Once upon a time, there was the Disney princess: Blonde, blue-eyed, and not particularly bright. That princess has now been upstaged by a pauper–a 10-year-old chess prodigy from the slums of Kampala, who has checkmated that Disney trope with the finesse with which she topples kings on the chessboard.
That is the premise of Mira Nair’s latest project, Queen of Katwe, which had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF). Her previous ventures into large studio filmmaking, like Vanity Fair or Amelia, may have fizzled, but she’s found froth in this delightful tale, based on the actual Phiona Mutesi’s journey from seller of maize to master of chess.
Yikes, yet another inspiring sports saga? You may well yowl. But Nair takes that...
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