'I KILLED my mother when I was four years old." That's the dramatic first line spoken by sensitive Lily Owens (Dakota Fanning) in The Secret Life of Beesafter a prologue depicting her mother's death. It's 10 years on, and Lily, who lives with her volatile widower father (Paul Bettany), still blames herself for that tragic accident.

The film is a timely reminder of a not too distant past: the setting is a small town in South Carolina in 1964, when the prospect of a black man becoming US president was unimaginable. The Civil Rights Act has just been passed, and black people are allowed to vote for the first time.

In a startling early scene, Rosaleen (Jennifer Hudson), the young woman employed as housekeeper at the Owens peach farm, is on her way to register as a voter when she is attacked verbally and then physically by white bigots.

In a sequence that echoes Huckleberry Finn, Lily goes on the run with Rosaleen, who is sought by the police. They find refuge in the brightly pink-painted home of a black woman, August Boatwright (Queen Latifah), who runs a 28-acre bee farm and a successful honey- aking business. August shares the house with her younger sisters, the sassy, cello-playing civil rights activist June (Alicia Keys) and the nervy, emotional May (Sophie Okonedo), who is traumatised after the death of her twin sister and maintains her own wailing wall, where she leaves all her sad notes.

Based on Sue Monk Kidd's best-selling novel, The Secret Life of Beesis a coming-of-age tale in which the black characters serve the function of providing love, hope and redemption for Lily, the troubled white girl. This suggests that while the world may have moved on, Hollywood remains rooted in narrative conventions from four decades ago.

"They're so cultured," Lily sighs. "I've never met Negro women like them before." Not only are they cultured, well-off and smartly dressed, but the Boatwrights provide Lily with a surrogate family and a maternal figure in August, a sage fund of homespun philosophy. "The world is just one big bee yard," she declares. "The rules are the same."

The storyline relies too heavily on coincidences, and writer- director Gina Prince-Bythewood treats it with a heavy hand, spelling out its themes of tolerance and of home being where you find it. It is a handsome production, and the capable cast invest their material with a conviction that holds the attention.

Directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood. Starring Queen Latifah, Dakota Fanning, Jennifer Hudson, Alicia Keys, Sophie Okonedo, Paul Bettany. 15A cert, Cork Omniplex; Cineworld/IMC Dún Laoghaire, Dublin, 112 min **