Exotic and colourful tales from the ethnic ghetto

Three years ago when Mira Nair made The Namesake, she got rave reviews in the western media. American critics especially loved the story of migrants who found it difficult to assimilate with US society while their more-Americanised children were caught between two cultures.

“A magnificent meditation on what it means for many to be American in the 21st Century,” said one critic. “If there is no other reason to see the film (other than the performances of Tabu and Khan), it is to see the cultural details of the people of India,” wrote another.

Her earlier film Monsoon Wedding provided even more colour and customs of a distant land. Nair made sure there were not only Marigolds and rains; she put in family secrets and illicit love affairs to spice up the mix. Once again the critics were bowled over.

Yet, when her latest film Amelia was released a few days ago, the critics came down on her like a ton of bricks. “Oh mama, the minute the characters open their mouths, the onslaught of cliches brings the movie down in flames,” writes the critic for the Rolling Stone. “An ambitious and handsome-looking picture that tells its story in the dullest, most confusing way possible,” said the respected Salon.

Manohla Dargis, the respected critic of The New York Times skewered the film (“exasperatingly dull”) and the director too: “Mira Nair, whose only qualification appears to be that she’s a woman who has made others films about and with women...” Ouch.

What happened? How could a director whose earlier films got such lovely praise barely three years ago suddenly become talentless and uninspiring? True creative persons do go through their ups and downs, but can someone fail so spectacularly? All the right ingredients were there—a story of a brave woman (Amelia Earhart, the pioneering female pilot), a two-Oscar winning actress, Hillary Swank, a handsome lead, Richard Gere and all the planes, buildings and clothes to create a period setting. What went wrong? Not having seen the film I can’t comment on it, but one can understand where this criticism is coming from.  Multiculturalism is big in the US, Britain, Canada and Australia.

Liberal whites love books and movies on faraway cultures, with all the colour, the quaint customs, the traditions and rituals. If someone can present it in an easily understandable way and bring in issues they understand — lesbianism in Fire, child abuse in Monsoon Wedding — then so much the better.

In The Namesake a Bengali family tries to make a life in the US and raises a typical American teenager who rebels against arranged marriage (another bizarre eastern custom); it was ideal for the multiculturalism framework. The book had already laid the ground with vignettes like the lady of the house mixing spices with Rice Crispies to turn it into a Bengali snack, probably an allegorical references to the east-west encounter. Precious, yes, but guaranteed to thrill Americans.

But when such filmmakers or authors try their hand at “real” American subjects, critics make their displeasure clear. Another of Nair’s ventures, Vanity Fair was also trashed. Or take the example of the indifferent novel Brick Lane about the lives of Bangladeshi migrants in London. It was shortlisted for the Booker prize, with critics loving “emotional conflicts” of the immigrant. Her second, Alentejo Blue, set in Portugal with nary a Bangladeshi in sight sank like a stone.

Multicultralism rocks. Scores of filmmakers and writers have latched on to this multicultural schtick and made handsome careers out of it. But while a Karan Johar or a Vipul Shah aims at the mass market — Sikhs of Southall, Gujaratis of New Jersey — Nair, Deepa Mehta, Jhumpa Lahiri et al have their eye on the cultural elite — the academic, intellectual, festival, Oscar circuit.

But the multicultural market is now getting very crowded. Writers and filmmakers are coming out of the woodwork and every subject has more or less been addressed, all taboos explored and we are in danger of running out of colourful rituals. What is more, now foreign filmmakers like Danny Boyle have latched on to the mysterious East.

Of course there is always the Indian market. We Indians love anyone who has had some recognition abroad. It doesn’t matter if a book is a poor read or a film is boring; as long as it is done by a foreign-based Indian, we will accord it proper respect.

Even though many Indians thought The Namesake was terribly precious and tedious, the culture-wallahs greeted the movie with awe (the janata was less impressed.) The same will happen with Amelia. Nair’s fan following will ensure a reverential response. But in its flop there is a lesson for the purveyors of multicultural stories; stick to your ethnic ghetto.
Straying away from it can be dangerous.