(Aishwarya Rai with Martin Henderson -- Photo: Miramax Films)
Raj S. Rangarajan
The clever title of the film says it all. Author Jane Austen may not have approved the corruption of her famous book title, but director Gurinder Chadha has gotten away with it. Perhaps. Bride & Prejudice is a light comedy with no objectives to meet. It could qualify as an Indian musical with 8-10 songs in English with a white actor Will Darcy’s (played by New Zealander Martin Henderson) wooing Lalita Bakshi (Aiswarya Rai) and just when he thinks he has her, he loses.
With a script from Chadha and her husband Paul Mayeda Berges who also co-wrote Beckham here comes a story that would perhaps appeal to your “soft” side. Chadha says, “while washing the dishes, she was struck by an idea: why not mesh the Eastern mystique of Bollywood with Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.” Chadha saw in Aiswarya Rai an Austen character – feisty and independent Elizabeth Bennet with brains and guts.
Bride is a formula story with a twist where an obsessed mother wants her four daughters married. Whether she succeeds and how well she does is part of the narrative. The mother in the movie, Manorama Bakshi (Nadira Babar) does a good job (a woman larger than life, according to Chadha), but Nitin Ganatra’s (“No life without wife” Mr. Kholi) first attempt at humour tends to jar a bit. His earlier roles have been on stage with Sam Mendes and the Donmar Warehouse and in the mini-series version of The Canterbury Tales.
(Caption: Namrata Shirodkar, Nadira Babar and Anupam Kher; Photo: Miramax Films)
Anupam Kher who also appeared as the father in Beckham and several other comedic roles in Bollywood, and Aiswarya Rai have the best lines and they carry them off with aplomb most of the time. Being a pretty face and having a storyline that’s right up her alley Lalita - high strung and incensed about American tycoon Darcy’s seeming lack of respect for India carries the movie up to a point. If you believe that many a romance has started with a verbal duel Chadha has gotten it right with Lalita and Darcy going hammer and tongs at the slightest provocation. Their “now on” and “now off” dalliance sequences carry the story along splendidly with Naveen Andrews (The English Patient, ABC drama Lost) playing a supporting role as Darcy’s friend.
Namrata Shirodkar (Hathyar, Charas) Miss India 1993, (Jaya Bakshi in the movie) plays a subdued role. Chadha’s direction is superb in places, but making a slapstick shtick with translated – rather – transliterated humour is perhaps not easy.
Kher is in his element as father Chaman Bakshi but overbearing Mrs. Bakshi seems to move the story by herself. North American audiences may like the hodgepodge film thanks to songs in English with a Mariachi Mexican band, soul music on the beach in California, the dandia-raas garba and of course the boisterous Bhangra in Amritsar. Whether it will help at the box office remains to be seen. Adults living in North America and kids who have grown up here may want to see the movie more because of the curiosity factor since Beckham raised expectations that Bride does not live up to.
(Namrata Shirodkar & Aishwarya Rai -- Photo: Miramax Films)
Lest you get the impression that Bride & Prejudice is another sentimental mishmash, you are treated to a “dishum-dishum” cinema-hall scene when hero (Martin Henderson) and Johnny Wickham (Daniel Gillies) who is interested in two of the Bakshi girls, mix it up when another movie is on. The scene seems straight out of an old Western, adopted for H(B)ollywood.
“With a multinational crew, challenges differ”, says Chadha. In India there was the dust, the heat, the slowness and the chaos, which the westerners had to get used to, but on the other hand, the director felt “it was even harder for us in America because suddenly there were so many rules…its more organized but more rigid.”
Chadha pays a lot of respect to choreographer Saroj Khan for her active tutoring of dance sequences to Henderson and Andrews and New Yorker Ashanti Shequoiya Douglas is singled out for the Goa Groove song on the beach. Santosh Sivan, known for his camera skills was thrilled to be able to use naturalistic lighting for intimate scenes and in the wide western outdoors of London and los Angeles, he improvised to prevent it appearing unBollywood-like.
An ideal film for a lazy weekend or when its cold and snowing. Being released, Feb. 11, in most major cities including New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco.
The Canadian Premiere of the film is set for Feb 8, 2005 and proceeds will be donated to Masala! Mehndi! Masti! 2005.
[Raj S. Rangarajan is a New York based freelance writer. He covers trend stories on art, travel and lifestyles and reviews books, films and plays for media based in New York, California, Toronto, India and Australia.]
