Monsoon Wedding

Dir: Mira Nair

2001

****

When Mira Nair's romantic drama Monsoon Wedding was released in 2001 it was referred to as a celebration of Bollywood meets Hollywood, which is simply not true. Monsoon Wedding is neither Bollywood nor Hollywood, the tagline is lazy and misleading, and somewhat insulting if you ask me, and the film deserves so much more than that. The story is something of a much ado about nothing, set before a big wedding in an upper-class modern New Delhi. The story features a financially worried father of the bride, a wedding planner smitten with the family's maid, a bride with a secret lover and an uncle with a dark secret. A large section of the story was lost when a lot of footage was destroyed when the film reels were passed through an airport x-ray machine but I'm not sure the final movie could have coped with any further sub-plots. Nair's direction is superb with every scene visually rich with colour and vibrancy. The editing is also great, as the story flows from character to character with a wonderful fluidity, no one character or story has more screen time than they need to and everyone receives their fair share. The acting is also superb, Naseeruddin Shah's performance is so real you forget that you are watching a film, it is like watching a fly on the wall documentary. The romance of the film doesn't actually come from the couple getting married but from the Wedding planner (played by the charismatic Vijay Raaz) and the family's maid Alice (played by the beautiful Tillotama Shome) which gives the story an interesting alternative look at love outside of an arranged marriage. The film is joyous, full of charm and happiness with brilliant character detail considering just how many characters there are. The film's music is also stunning, it is infectious and made me want to get up and dance. The film does have a darker side to it when a secret is unearthed by the bride's uncle. It is a delicate subject but is handled firmly by Nair and the actors involved. The visuals are stunning throughout but even more so towards the end of the film during the celebrations. The rain scenes are particularly magnificent. It was the first Indian film since Satyajit Ray's 1956 film Aparajito to win the Golden Lion, the highest prize at the Venice Film Festival, and it was well deserved. A wonderfully uplifting film that is perfect to get lost in.

11'09"1 September 11
Dir: Samira Makhmalbaf, Claude Lelouch, Youssef Chahine, Danis Tanovic, Idrissa Ouedraogo, Ken Loach, Alejandro González Iñárritu, Amos Gitai, Mira Nair, Sean Penn, Shohei Imamura
2002
****
11'09''01 is a collection of short films by 11 selected directors from around the world. Each one was given complete freedom to react to the events that happened in New York that day and the results were varied. The collection is of a high standard generally, with some standing out over others, as a collection it is of extreme historical value, is importance seems even more relevant today over a decade later. 

Samira Makhmazbaf - Samira Makhmalbaf highlights the innocents of the children who are most likely to be effected by the results of 9/11 as the village concentrate on building bomb shelters made of bricks, a teacher struggles to educate her class. Poignant, especially as we now know the fate of those children. 

Claude Lelouch - Lelouch uses deafness as a metaphor to show the vulnerability of many that day and also of the unheard voices of that day. He also shows the unexpectedness of the events and the regret we have. 

Youssef Chahine - A misguided and confusing short, if I was in charge it wouldn't have made the cut. I couldn't tell you what the underline meaning was but then I bet Chahine wouldn't be able to give a coherent answer either. A weak submission. 

Danis Tanovic - Tanovic's short shows a group of women, who although shocked and disgusted like the rest of the world, decide to continue with there ongoing protest to the death of their loved ones in war torn Bosnia. 

Idrissa Ouedraogo - This is a more light-hearted short, with a group of kids who think they have found Bin-Laden and try to capture him for reward money. This could be seen as an attack on those who capitalised on the events of 9/11 but in this case, the boys want to spend the money on good, to pay for the medical treatment for one of the boy's mother. 

Ken Loach - Loach takes a different approach to the other directors by taking a real person, 
Vladimir Vega, a Chilean whom took part in protests during the fateful murder of Allende in the 70's, who compares the similarities between the two events and empathises with the people involved through writing a letter to them. 

Alejandro González Iñárritu - Alejandro González Iñárritu's short film is mainly just audio recorded in New York on 9/11. Here and there we see flash imagery of the towers burning and the people falling. This adds nothing to the collection, is completely uncreative and is completely pointless not to mention distasteful. The weakest submission by far. Moore did it much better in Fahrenheit 9/11 and in a much more dignified fashion. 

Amos Gitai - Gitai takes us back to 9/11 but to Israel, where on that morning a car bomb exploded killing several people. It was a suicide bomber. The film doesn't take anything away from New York's pain, it just reminds that this is a daily occurrence in some places around the world, also begs the question, where is the rest of the world on this war on terror? 

Mira Nair - This is probably the most touching and important short of the collection. Nair tells the true story of a Muslim family living in America whose son is killed in the attack. At first the young man is branded as one of the terrorists and the family is scrutinised and mistrusted. In the end, it is realised that the man had actually gone there to help but was killed in the process, highlighting peoples ignorance, misconceptions and the fact that the government has done very little to ease race hatred. 

Sean Penn - I seem to be one of the few that like Penn's short. It is a fairly irrelevant story but a touching one all the same. I'm a big Ernest Borgnine fan and he's brilliant in this as a sad old man, not quite getting to grips with the loss of his wife and living in the shadow of the towers. When they fall, he has a moment of joy as his apartment is filled with light for the first time in years but then it only seems to highlight that his wife isn't there. I personally think Penn took his brief and really ran with it, maybe more so than most of the other directors. 

Shohei Imamura - Certainly the strangest of the collection. This was to be his last film, and declaring that 'There is no such thing as a Holy War' through the spoken work of a snake is a hell of a way to go out.

The Reluctant Fundamentalist
Dir: Mira Nair
2012
****
Maybe The Reluctant Fundamentalist's lack of success is down to the fact that it faces peoples prejudices head on. Some have suggested that the title alone put people off, so it seems people don't even want to know. This is the sad truth as The Reluctant Fundamentalist puts a lot of things into perspective. It's a classic thriller in the sense that nothing is how it seems but the twist is that this is real, it's happening all the time all over the world. It tackles big subjects such as prejudice, paranoia, patriotism and good old fashioned lies (told best by governments and mainstream media alike). It might go some in helping people with their misconceptions of other cultures, countries and religions but the majority don't seem to care. They're comfortable in their little western lives, who cares if a bomb goes off on the other side of the world, it's their problem and they probably had it coming for some reason or other. It's a sad world. Watch this film and think. Content aside, the direction is very good as are the performances although I'm still not convinced that Kate Hudson was right for her role. Riz Ahmed however, is the man and definitely one to watch.