The sweet taste of Stanley's Dabba

Film: Stanley Ka Dabba (U)
Director: Amol Gupte
Featuring: Partho, Amol Gupte, Divya Dutta

I can’t believe a film could be made based on a tiffin box. But it’s true — I’ve watched it. Stanley (a Std IV schoolboy played by Partho) is a cute, naughty-looking poetry lover who tries to kill his hunger by drinking water.

Mr Verma (a Hindi teacher, played by Amol Gupte) is the cruellest person in the whole film. Just because he never brings his own 'dabba' and eats the children’s food and Stanley (with his friends) goes somewhere else to eat, he throws the boy out of the class.

Rosie Miss is the best person in the film. She is really sweet and kind to every child. She is creative and understands children and their talents.

Akram is Stanley’s only friend outside school and he is also like a parent to Stanley. Akram helps Stanley to make a lighthouse as a science project, complete with live fish, which Mrs Iyer (the science teacher) does not like, because she has no imagination. I could not believe the actress who is Mrs Iyer in the film played her role so well, though she has a very strict and mean teacher’s role.

In the film, I liked that every morning Stanley turns the pages of the calendar. The first morning when he turns the page the date is November 15, which is my birthday. I also realised that Stanley is in IV F and that is the class I am going to.

Stanley’s ‘dabba’ is like a character in the movie. In the beginning it is missing, but later on it miraculously appears. I did not like Mr Verma because he has a disease — of not bringing his own 'dabba' and eating other people’s tiffin. Thank god this doesn’t happen in my school!

– The writer, 8, is a student of Jamnabai Narsee School, Mumbai