Synopsis

Akeelah Anderson, a gifted but reluctant student from South Los Angeles, discovers an extraordinary talent for spelling. With encouragement from her mother, her school community, and a demanding mentor, she begins preparing for increasingly difficult competitions. As Akeelah advances toward the national spelling bee, she must overcome self-doubt, family pressures, and the fear that standing out will separate her from the people she loves.

Factoids & Trivia

• The film was shot in only 31 days, with filming taking place in California and Washington, D.C.

• The final word in the competition, "logorrhea," was also the winning word featured in the 2002 documentary Spellbound, which followed contestants from the 1999 Scripps National Spelling Bee.

• National Spelling Bee pronouncer Jacques Bailly appears in the film. He is the real-life pronouncer for the competition and won the Scripps National Spelling Bee in 1980.

• George Hornedo, who plays Roman, had been a National Spelling Bee finalist and informally helped with the film's spelling-bee details.

• A quotation displayed in Dr. Larabee's office is commonly attributed to Nelson Mandela, but it actually comes from Marianne Williamson's book A Return to Love.

• The movie was the first feature produced by Starbucks Coffee.

• Akeelah and the Bee received recognition from the National Board of Review, the NAACP Image Awards, the Black Movie Awards, the Christopher Awards, and the Young Artist Awards.