There’s a not insignificant legacy of terrible movies about poor brown kids being taught out of poverty by godly white people like Sandra Bullock. Mira Nair’s Queen of Katwe isn’t one of those movies. The lack of a white savior spares this Disney family film from being a schmaltzy embarrassment. Is that faint praise? Yeah, maybe.
Queen of Katwe’s protagonist—a Ugandan tween named Phiona—dominates at chess with the help of a teacher, yes, but that teacher is a black, Ugandan one, Robert (David Oyelowo). Robert teaches the slum kids chess because these kids are fighters, and chess is a game for fighters. The scrappiest, fightiest of them all is Phiona (Madina Nalwanga), who quickly demonstrates that just because you can’t read, that doesn’t mean you can’t slay all day on the chess board. It’s based on a true story, BTW. Awesome!