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Monsoon Wedding [2002]


RRP: £9.99
Our Price: £6.99 (subject to change)

Editorial
Amazon.co.uk Review

Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding is a return to the form of Salaam Bombay!, her 1988 feature. Nair's gift for observation of the everyday and love for her characters makes for a delightful film, with the whole web of family relationships that knit and break during a wedding being spun at a perfect pace.

The excellent performances exceed the often stereotypical roles on offer; the incomparable Nasiruddin Shah as the harassed father, Kulbhushan Kharbanda as the comic uncle, or Shefali Chaya as the orphaned cousin. Nair's sympathetic eye for the unnoticed and the harassed is at its best when showing the tender romance between the servant and Dube (Vijay Raaz), the marigold-munching upwardly-mobile wedding coordinator, who brings pathos and humour to the often unseen servant classes. The handheld camera gives a docu-drama feel to this celebratory look at the upper middle class Hindu Punjabi joint family, while paying tribute to modern Indian public culture of music, television and of course "Bollywood".

On the DVD: The viewer should watch the film once with Dolby Digital 5.1, then again with the director's commentary, with its excellent social analysis and fascinating anecdotal history. The trailer and behind the scenes are much less interesting. It would have been good to have had a full soundtrack of the songs but the viewer will have to buy the CD. --Rachel Dwyer


The Real India
Review date: 2008-10-24 Rating: 10 out of 10

As someone who grew up in India, I can say that this is an accurate portrayal of upper-middle class India.

If you want to move away from the usual pictures of India being ridden with poverty, or the nonsensical dancing of Bollywood movies, then please watch this movie. It will bring a much clearer and truer picture of what modern India is like.

As the other reviewers have suggested it, there is a flourish of colour and celebration. The music is also fantastic and the acting is also excellent.

Buy it, you will not be disappointed and you will have learnt a lot too!

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Reviews


Family, Love and Weddings in Contemporary India.
Review date: 2007-12-23 Rating: 10 out of 10

Mira Nair delivers an interesting and insightful alternative to traditional Bollywood fare in `Monsoon Wedding'. Contemporary India is rendered in a humorous, insightful and touching manner, in a film that revolves around an affluent family's wedding preparations for their daughter. While tackling the influence of Western culture on India's younger generation and depicting their sexual relationships, Nair's film also has nods towards a more traditional India encapsulated in the alternative wedding of a maid/servant. Similarly `Monsoon Wedding' possesses all the colour, vitality and music of any good Bollywood movie, while still satisfying a Western audience more used to love and sex depicted in a physical, rather than symbolic manner. This is an extremely touching film that embraces some presumably risqué issues for an Indian film, namely, adultery, sexual desire, and child abuse. However don't worry it all comes good in the end with a wonderfully bold, colourful and musical ending when the guests dance with gusto and all the aplomb of a Bollywood musical. One word of warning, I had to watch this film twice in order to fully appreciate its subtler aspects, and the dialogue that seems to flit between Indian languages (subtitled) and English can be difficult to follow. But persevere because this is an extremely rewarding experience.



Don'texpect a typical Bollywood movie
Review date: 2007-12-15 Rating: 10 out of 10

If you're expecting an "exotic India" kind of movie, you'd be better off not seeing it. This is a contemporary film, and it's made with love. Acting is terrific, and it becomes obvious that actors had so much synergy while working on the movie. Only a very cynical person wouldn't be emotionally touched by the story and the characters. A great film to see with your significant other on a weekend. Warm fuzzy feelings all the way!


Did the critics actually watch this movie?
Review date: 2007-03-31 Rating: 2 out of 10

I've seen so many 5 star reviews for this film, online, in magazines and newspapers - but I can't help feel like everyone's got it wrong!

I rented this movie on sky box office a while ago and was taken in by the reviews calling it light hearted, funny and beautiful to watch. But I found myself bored and confused by the whole movie. The storyline confused me right from the start, as did the characters and plot. Nothing much seemed to be happening throughout the movie.

Whatever the storyline, the director knows how to make a beautiful movie. The set, costumes and soundtrack do make it well worth watching if only for the cinematography - but that's about the only reason to give it a try.

Prepare to be bored!

Enjoyable, impressive cinematography, but a rather slight story
Review date: 2007-02-18 Rating: 8 out of 10

This is a most engrossing and enjoyable film, but one that is not without flaws. Monsoon Wedding, as the director explains in one of the DVD's "extra" tracks, is a celebration of the upper middle class urban Punjabi life style: energetic, ambitious, Westernized, noisy and earthy. Underlying the film is the tension between modernity and tradition in India today, a contrast that the director often makes explicit by switching from the sophistication of the wealthy family preparing for the wedding to the wonderful, ageless chaos of the Delhi streets. There are moments of ravishing cinematography - the scenes filmed in the rain are quite magnificently done, for example. The colours (the director throughout favours blocks of pastel shades) and the music are impressive, but not quite as spectacular as some reviewers have suggested, and some people may find the tale as a whole a frustratingly slight one. It is sometimes rather difficult to follow the English passages, and there are episodes of the plot (such as it is) that are a little unconvincing. The bride-to-be, for instance, switches overnight from a passionate affair with her lover, to an almost equally passionate attachment to her fiancé, with an ease that rather beggars belief. These aspects apart, this is a fast-moving, watchable and memorable film, and one that is very much worth seeing.

Product Details/Specifications


Actor(s):
Parveen Dabaas
Naseeruddin Shah
Neha Dubey
Randeep Hooda
Sameer Arya

Creators:
Naseeruddin Shah (Primary Contributor)
Sameer Arya (Primary Contributor)

Director(s):

Recording label: Cinema Club
Manufacturer: Cinema Club
EAN: 5014138295868
Binding: DVD
Number of items: 1
Format: Anamorphic, PAL,
Release date: 2003-06-16
Number of discs: 1
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Audience rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
Region code: 2
Running time: 109 minutes
Theatrical release date: 2001
Language: English (Original Language)
Language: Hindi (Original Language)
Language: Punjabi (Original Language)
Language: Urdu (Original Language)
Language: English (Subtitled)

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