I wish I took the time to write this post right after watching the movie, but my hubby and I caught a showing of The Secret Life of Bees a few weeks ago on a whim.  As someone who rarely goes to the movies anymore, this was definitely worth the trip to see it on the big screen.  With a cast that includes several musician-actresses Queen Latifah, Alicia Keyes, and Jennifer Hudson, I was initially leery to check out a chick flick sans some of the chick flick classic divas.  However, I was wrong.  These ladies along with Sophie Okenodo really brought the story to life.

Ladies, this will channel all of your mother issues as each character has a story to tell.  There are moments where I could have used a tissue box (lots of those moments so be prepared) and moments that I outted a belly laugh.  My!  Dakota Fanning is growing up, but she played her role as Lily well.  Her character is near and dear to my own heart as she dreams of being a writer.

Kudos to Gina Prince-Bythewood who directed the on screen version and has classics such as “Love and Basketball” and “Disappearing Acts” on her resume.

The NY Times published a review called “A Golden Dollup of Motherly Comfort“.  The first paragraph is below…

Adapted by Gina Prince-Bythewood from the best-selling novel by Sue Monk Kidd, “The Secret Life of Bees” unfolds in a sentimental, honey-glazed land that vaguely resembles South Carolina in 1964. It would be wrong to say that the troubles of that time and place have been wished away — on the contrary, the movie begins with a scene of horrific domestic violence and includes child abuse, a racially motivated beating, suicide and the threat of a lynching — but from the opening voice-over to the final credits, every terror and sorrow is swaddled in warm, therapeutic comfort…

Now, don’t get lulled into love and happiness from the start of this review because the NY times article ends with a backhand that is worthy and debatable at the same time.

…In case they didn’t have enough problems of their own, August and her sisters also have Lily to deal with, and the film seems to struggle with an awkward and unstated tension. You can almost feel how badly it wants to be about the lives, not of bees, but of black women at a pivotal moment in the recent past.

Despite Ms. Prince-Bythewood’s best efforts to retain a sense of history, and Queen Latifah’s shrewd refusal to play her character according to stereotype, the film becomes a familiar and tired fable of black selflessness, in which African-Americans take time out from their struggle against oppression to lift the battered self-esteem of white people who have the good sense not to be snarling bigots. Even Ms. Fanning, weeping on cue and looking uncomfortable otherwise, seems a little abashed that the movie, in the end, has to be all about her.

Here’s also an excerpt of the review written in Black Voices…

After a long delay, Sue Monk Kidd’s bestseller, ‘The Secret Life Of Bees’ is finally a film– with an all-star cast to boot. Directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood, and starring Dakota Fanning, Jennifer Hudson, Queen Latifah, Alicia Keys, Sophie Okonedo, and Tristan Wilds, the film is laced with dramatic and powerful performances. It’s certain to satisfy the fans of the book and newcomers to the story.

Set in South Carolina in 1964, the film is the moving tale of Lily Owens (Fanning) a 14 year-old girl who is haunted by the memory of her late mother (Hilary Burton). To escape her lonely life and troubled relationship with her father (Paul Bettany), Lily flees with Rosaleen (Hudson), her caregiver and only friend. The duo travels to a South Carolina town that holds the secret to her mother’s past. Rosaleen is also a fugitive, having fled from authorities after standing up for herself against white racists…

Have you seen the film?  If so, how would you rate it?  Do you agree with the NY Times assessment?

Dreamgirl, Sex and the City, The Secret Life of Bees, American Idol contestant, Oscar-winner, songstress, shall I go on?  Just when things seem to be going in all the right directions, Jennifer Hudson received the news today that no one ever would want to hear- her mother and brother were shot and killed in their Southside Chicago home.  To top it off, Jennifer’s nephew Julian King (although reports are conflicting as to his specific relationship to Hudson) is missing and an Amber Alert has been issued.

Please pray, share positive energy, leave comments of support on this post for Jennifer during this extremely difficult time.

Here’s the report as told by E! online news- JENNIFER HUDSON’S MOM FOUND SHOT TO DEATH

A nightmare for this Dreamgirl.

Sources confirm to E! News that Jennifer Hudson’s mother, 57-year-old Darnell Donerson, was found dead Friday afternoon in a house on the South Side of Chicago that is listed in Donerson’s name.

Officer John Mirabelli of the Chicago Police Department tells E! that officers were called to a house in the 7000 block of Yale Avenue in the neighborhood of Englewood, where just before 3 p.m. they discovered two unresponsive adults—one male, one female—who had apparently been shot to death.

The shooting is at this time believed to be domestic, according to police. Various reports are claiming that the other victim was Hudson’s older brother, Jason Hudson.

A 7-year-old boy named Julian King has also been reported missing, but authorities aren’t confirming whether he’s a relative of Jennifer Hudson.

Per the Chicago Tribune, police are looking for a white 1994 Chevrolet Suburban registered to Jason Hudson with Illinois license plate No. X584859. They say the boy could be inside and an Amber Alert has been issued.

A rep for the Cook County Medical Examiner told E! that the female victim was shot in the head, while a 29-year-old man sustained a gunshot wound to the chest.

Mirabelli could not confirm the victims’ identities, but a source close to Jennifer Hudson confirmed that an initial local-TV report identifying Donerson as a victim, based on information provided by a representative of the family’s church, Pleasant Gift Missionary Baptist, was true.

A large crowd had gathered outside the home, where police tape was blocking all comers from getting too close. According to the Cook County Assessor’s Office, Donerson purchased the 1,910-square-foot house in 1996.

E! has learned that Jennifer Hudson was in Florida when she heard the news and is currently en route to Chicago. In happier times, she had been planning to go to Japan Monday to promote her new album, but that trip has been canceled.

The Secret Life of Bees star had also been set to appear next week at the Hollywood Awards to help collect an ensemble cast honor.

“Everyone at Fox Searchlight and Twentieth Century Fox wishes to extend our deepest condolences to Jennifer and her family,” the Bees studio said in a statement Friday evening. “Our thoughts are with them in this time of profound sadness.”

“My faith in God and my family, they’re very realistic and very normal, they’re not into the whole limelight kind of thing, so when I go home to Chicago that’s just another place that’s home,” Hudson, who got engaged last month to boyfriend David Otunga, said in a recent interview with the Associated Press.

“I stand in line with everybody else, or, when I go home to my mom I’m just Jennifer, [so her mother tells her], ‘You get up and you take care of your own stuff.’ And I love that; I don’t like when people tell you everything you want to hear—I want to hear the truth, you know what I mean?”

The Oscar winner purchased a posh condo on Chicago’s North Side in 2006 for $537,500. Her digs were featured on the Sept. 28 season premiere of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition when she offered decorating advice for a young girl’s new bedroom.

—Additional reporting by Ashley Fultz, Jason Kennedy, Marc Malkin and Claudia Rosenbaum

(Originally published Oct. 24, 2008 at 3:07 p.m. PT)