| BRICK LANE |
 2007 - UKDirector: Sarah Gavron
- Reviewed by Linda
The film starts out with gorgeous, almost soft-focus flashbacks of two village girls—sisters—frolicking in their idyllic village life, scampering around, not a care in the world. When their forlorn mother commits suicide by deliberately walking into the lake, suddenly the girls' fate is changed forever. Nanzeen is no longer a child (in village standards at least) so is married off. Next thing she knows, she is waving goodbye to her sister, and is on her way to England, promised to an older Bangladeshi man that she has never met. Flash forward, and Nanzeen (Tannishtha Chatterjee) is living on Brick Lane, in a working-class Bangladeshi neighborhood in London. After almost 20 years of marriage, her husband Chanu (Satish Kaushik) has lots of ideas, but is not very successful—he crows about how he will one day be a famous and respected English professor, much to the horrid embarrassment of their British-born daughters. Nazneen, being very traditional, is also very lonely. She maintains the house and goes shopping, but has no social life, and her only friend is her far-away beloved sister, with whom she has kept in contact through letters. But Nanzeen's life suddenly changes when the family falls into some financial trouble, and she picks up some work sewing clothes in her home. Suddenly, she has some tenuous contact with the outside world, specifically via the handsome young delivery man Karim (Christopher Simpson) who brings her sewing jobs to her door. He is a Bangladeshi of the new world, with a thick working class London accent, and is smitten with her meek "village girl" background. Sparks fly between the two, and their eventual illicit romance makes Nazneen blossom. But you know with any illicit romance, trouble comes. Brick Lane is completely carried by Tannishtha Chatterjee's performance. She is absolutely lovely, sad, wistful, and completely heartbreaking as Nanzeen. You clutch yourself, only wanting the best for her. She has been so completely sheltered, that she desperately holds romanticized memories of her previous life—but at the same time she knows that she would never be able to return. Satish Kaushik is excellent as her boorish husband. He starts out as a caricature and surprisingly develops into someone not only sympathetic, but noble and selfless. I felt that the book probably dealt more intimately with the religious and political backdrop of the film (after 9/11, Karim and the other young men of the community suddenly become defensively righteous, taking back "traditional" Islam, much to the confusion and, in some cases, anger of the first-generation immigrants). I found the story of the affair between Nanzeen and Karim to be realistic, and luckily (and surprisingly) it didn't take a clichéd path. As a tale of a woman awakening into independence and self-awareness, I thought the Brick Lane did a nice job, and is worth checking out. |
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The screening I attended of Brick Lane was abuzz and atwitter, as much of the audience apparently were big fans of
the best-selling book of the same name by Monica Ali. A story of Bangladeshi woman immigrant living in a working class neighborhood of London, the story wrestles with passion, tradition, and religion, all with a backdrop of post-9/11 turmoil. As I hadn't read the book and came with no expectations, I thought the film was quite good—but I heard a few murmurs in the audience that the film was a glossier take on what is actually a more complex story. So, fans of the book, be warned.
