ROM COM MONDAY: Love & Basketball (2000)

All’s fair in love and basketball…

In 1981 in L.A., Monica Wright and her family move in next door to Quincy McCall. They’re eleven years old and both are avid basketball fans. The childhood friends both dream of playing in the NBA, just like Quincy’s dad. As they grow up, their playful love-hate relationship lasts into high school, but they never seem to find the right moment to turn it into something more meaningful. As high school ends, they finally admit their love for each other, but their all-consuming passion for basketball throws a spanner in the works. With both of them playing for the University of Southern California, their different approaches to life lead to a break-up. Some years later, they meet again. Will they be able to put their differences aside and see what’s really at stake?

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LOVE & BASKETBALL is the feature debut of director and screenwriter Gina Prince-Bythewood, who would go on to direct THE SECRET LIFE OF BEES and THE WOMAN KING, and was produced by Spike Lee. The fact that Lee trusted the debuting director so much that he produced her original screenplay says enough in itself. But it’s Prince-Bythewood’s own merit and talent that quickly turned the movie into a cult classic of Black cinema and the romantic genre. In her own words, Prince-Bythewoods wanted “to create a black WHEN HARRY MET SALLY.” But the writer-director does much more than that. She focuses on a female character who is an female athlete as well in a world where they’re still not considered equal to male athletes. Monica is constantly confronted with remarks about her (too athletic) body. Prince-Bythewood aims her gaze at Monica as well, but does this in a tender and celebratory way. This combined with an eclectic and meanwhile legendary R&B soundtrack makes LOVE & BASKETBALL an icon of 2000s (Black) cinema.

Gina Prince-Bythewood understands the complexities of burgeoning love and how we must find ourselves before committing to someone else. LOVE & BASKETBALL traces a love story over the years as the characters grow towards one another, then apart, before meeting in the middle once more.

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Part of ROM COM MONDAY!

! To attend to the whole programme, you need to make a separate reservation on our website !

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Director Gina Prince-Bythewood

US, 2000, 125 min

Cast Sanaa Lathan, Omar Epps, Glenndon Chatman

Spoken language English

Subtitles Dutch