|
Cinema fascinates, provokes, inspires and entertains more powerfully than any other media. Shaaditimes seeks to understand and interpret human relationships in all its nuances.
What better way to explore these intricacies than reviewing films that explore the agonies and ecstasies of human relationships?
If you too want to review any such film please do send it in to the editor.
Mistress Of SpicesRating : 
 Producers: Deepak Nayar and Gurinder Chadha
Director: Paul Mayeda Berges
Music: Craig Preuss
Featuring: Aishwarya Rai, Dylan McDermott, Anupam Kher, Nitin Ganatra, Padma Lakshmi and others
Based on a novel by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Mistress Of Spices is a mystical look at the USP of Indian foods - spices. A brief flashback sets the tone for young Tilo (named after Til, or the sesame seed) who, right from a young age, possesses unusual powers and has now been trained to solve others' problems with the help of these gifts and the latent power residing within our spices.
Tilo (Aishwarya Rai) begins operation in San Francisco, with a shop named Spice Bazaar, and acquires a name for herself. The conditions for maintaining her powers are that she should use the spices only to fulfill others' desires and never her own, that she should not be away from the spices (??) and that she should not touch another human's skin (!!). And she has to break all these three rules when a young man, Doug, literally crashes into her life (he has a mobike crash outside her store).
At a time when the world is almost convinced that India and Indians are on par with the most modern nations and peoples and is not a country where the streets are littered with elephants, camels, snake-charmers, faqirs and turbaned magicians, this film yanks our image back some 200 years when we see a modern young English-speaking woman indulge in such claptrap. Real medical properties of our exotic spices are exaggerated beyond logical realms and actually made to become the basis of complete mumbo-jumbo.
A word here about the relationship of our NRI filmmakers towards cinema would be timely. Most of our 'crossover' (sic) filmmakers freely indulge in open or subtle India-bashing under the pretentious desire to be called 'sporting' or probably to appeal to the perverse sense of fun of a section of the foreign (read non-Indian) audiences. This is one more such film - but when Indians love to mock at Indians, why should the world respect our country, countrymen, culture, and by corollary, cinema as well?
What we are told in this film is that a young, beautiful woman should actually suppress everything from her sexual desires to natural emotions if she must do her moral duty (make that double sic) in this world. This is the complete antithesis of the essence of Hindu philosophy and teachings - Hinduism teaches that the path to bliss, salvation, Heaven or whatever you call it lies through a fruitful worldly life where normal pleasures and responsibilities are healthy and it is the thoughts, words and deeds that should be healthy too!
We cannot blame a novelist for writing such a book. But we can emphatically point a finger at an NRI filmmaker (who presumably still considers herself an Indian in the one country where Indians are glittering 24/7) for choosing this balderdash to serve to a world audience. And it is very sad that she is completely ignorant of the core fundamentals of her own culture. Like they say in Germany, no one names a child or a street after Hitler, but we keep glorifying the regressive elements indulged in by charlatans over centuries!
The hero, Doug, does not quite know what to make of Tilo's quirks and commitments, but poor man, he accepts her as she is, respects everything about her and wants to help her at every stage. And that, unwittingly, is probably the only positive message at the end of the film - that you must accept the person you love unconditionally!
The plodding screenplay (at 96 minutes!!) does not help matters and finally our heart goes out to music director Craig Preuss, whose stunningly Indian and evolved music score (an object lesson to current Hindi film 'background music experts') as the only standout element of the film. The performances are woefully average, and for once we cannot even blame Ms. Rai for another clockwork-toy act. Dylan makes the best of a bad job, and Anupam Kher is his usual self, but Nitin Ganatra as Haroun the cabbie almost joins the music composer in giving this film much more than it deserved.
| KEY TO RATINGS: |
| Give away your ticket: |
|
| Watch it if you must: |
|
| Worth your while: |
|
| You'd be silly to miss it: |
|
The views expressed above are of the writer and shaaditimes does not necessarily endorse the same.
|
|
Rajiv Vijayakar
|
|
|
|
|
| |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
| | Cotton Kurta with Gold Print | Pink Printed Tunic | Wills Lifestyle Casual Top For Women | Rs.1,000 ($20.77) | | | | Rs.769 ($15.97) | Rs.2,135 ($44.35) | Rs.1,495 ($31.06) | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Ask our Experts :
Personality Development, Immigration (US), Tarot, Hot Couture, Face Value, Matrimonial Laws, Infertility, Life, etc, Gender Wars, Shaping Up. |
|
 |
|
Furl it
Reddit
Readers comment
