Brick Lane gets mixed reviews in UK

Critics call the movie dull & turgid, but Tannishtha Chatterjee has been nominated as the best actress

LONDON: The film attracted passionate protests and controversy even before it had been shot or screened, and the mixed responses continue even after it is premiered.

Brick Lane, the celluloid take on Monica Ali's critically acclaimed novel, had a red carpet premiere at the London Film Festival over the weekend, with high-profile guests like popular singer Lilly Allen and top British actor Bill Nighy gracing the event. But critics panned the film as ‘dull, ‘stultifying’ and ‘turgid.’

The coming of age story of Nazneen — played by Delhi actress Tannishtha Chatterjee — a young Bangladeshi girl who is married off to an older man and brought to live a new and daunting life in the East End of London, raised protests from residents of Brick Lane.

They stopped shooting arguing that the book, and the film did not depict their neighbourhood in a correct and friendly manner. They had nothing to worry about as the film, in an attempt not to antagonise anyone has taken such an 'even-handed' view of the community that it borders on boring.

“It manages the near impossible feat of transforming highly topical subjects such as Islamic radicalisation and infidelity within arranged marriages into the emotional equivalent of a Laura Ashley twinset,” says critic Kevin Maher. He describes Chatterjee's performance as 'blank'.

In fact Indian comic actor Satish Kaushik — who plays Nazneen's husband Chanu — is held up as the film's 'one winning turn' and Maher lauds him for his “fine work with mannerisms worthy of Oliver Hardy.”

However interestingly despite the panning by critics Chatterjee has been nominated for best actress for the British Independent Film Awards going head to head with one of the stalwarts of British cinema, Dame Judi Dench.

Dench is nominated for her excellent performance in Notes on a Scandal, along with Anne Hathaway who played Jane Austen in Becoming Jane and Sophia Myles for the quirky Scottish movie Hallam Foe.

Brick Lane's director Sarah Gavron has also been nominated for best director. Some critics feel the film certainly doesn't deserve the nominations, but it has probably been done in an attempt to be liberal and politically correct, and to rebut those who tried to stop the filming.