Wow, this movie is so beautifully put together its breathtaking! It's easy to get completely wrapped up in the storyline although still hard to watch how this woman's family put her down for her inability to speak English (I found a lot of little life lessons that can be taken away from this story ie: To be understanding of those that seem "different" than whats perceived as normal, to think about what we're saying to those that we love, to respect people from all walks of life). Despite all the poking fun of, the lack of time that her husband has for her & the disrespect her daughter shows ... this woman is a woman in every sense of the word She's vibrant, smart, caring, loving, compassionate & gentle. She has a childlike innocence to her, coupled with passion & inner strength to find & love herself. There are a lot of comedic scenes that will have you laughing & It's clean so, your whole family will be able to enjoy together (it will be hard for anyone who cannot read the subtitles to get the full idea that's being conveyed). I seen that this movie became available on DVD although it wasn't easy to find ... I didn't see a lot of publicity for it other than Flixter saying when it was being released. It was totally worth the effort to locate this movie ... it will be one to watch again!
Thanks for providing this.
Buy English Vinglish Hindi Blu Ray (Hindi Movie / Bollywood Film / Indian Cinema Blu Ray) (2012) Now
One of the best Bollywood films ever, unlike recent films it is far from superficial, a deep thought provoking film that inspires u to treat ppl better regardless of any language barriers.I guess, one day, Sridevi Kapoor but just "Sridevi" will do, thank you surveyed her demesne and decided to heck with her fifteen year hiatus from cinema. I think I'm on firm footing when I say that I'd put Sridevi's scintillating performance in English Vinglish against whichever other best you can come up with for 2012.It's a crap title, but that's the only negative thing I can think of about the movie. In an ocean of redundancy, English Vinglish surges against the tides. Does it add flavoring to learn that writer/director Gauri Shinde made the film in part as an apology to her mother, on whom she based the central character? Like the character's daughter, Gauri as a child was embarrassed of her mom's poor grasp of English. And here we were some years back, hailing Esperanto as the universal language.
In India, Shashi Godbole (Sridevi) is a dedicated housewife and devoted mother, never mind that she's marginalized by her husband (a smug Adil Hussain) and ridiculed by her daughter (Navika Kotia) for her provincial ways and for her inability to speak proper English. Shashi is a gifted cook who runs a modest business making and selling sweets to the neighborhood, an enterprise her husband looks down on. Y'know, here's a fella that's begging for an earnest asskicking.
The plot really kicks off when Shashi's older sister calls from New York asking for help in preparing for her daughter's impending nuptials. Picture Shashi in panic mode now, especially since she must fly for the first time and fly alone because the rest of her family aren't urgently needed and will meet her in New York in several weeks.
English Vinglish is mostly shot on location in New York, and it's there that Shashi embarks on her transformative journey. Okay, that's not right. It actually starts on that plane when Shashi ends up seated next to an obliging elderly gent (Amitabh Bachchan) who guides her thru the strange workings of an arduous international flight. For the duration of his brief cameo, Amitabh's helpful passenger does his darndest to enable Shashi.
It's not a film that sweeps you with the highest of stakes, and yet the scenes that play out are no less devastating. It's absorbing stuff, eyeballing this simple woman as she tries to cope in a scary, unfamiliar environment. I wonder, will you cringe in heartbreak like I did at the coffee shop scene as a thoroughly intimidated Shashi is braced by an aggressive counter clerk? Sridevi is so damn good. She reinforces that bit of wisdom that simple does not equate to stupid. Moments after this crushing scene, a gutted Shashi Godbole glimpses a bus ad claiming to teach paying students how to speak English in four weeks.
We track each of the hesitant choices Shashi makes, the small steps she takes to change herself, and we celebrate her incremental moments of triumph, until finally we arrive at that scene in which she navigates the bustling New York avenues with confident strides, handbag breezily flung over one shoulder. That scene makes me beam.
Gauri Shinde, who'd previously made short films and advertising spots, makes her feature film directorial debut, and it's a self-assured one. I guess we're waiting to see if she's a one-hit wonder. For now she's being lauded universally, and it's well-deserved. English Vinglish was such a pleasure to watch, a Bollywood feature that sharply separates itself from the homogenized efforts that sprinkle the breadth of Indian cinema. Shinde has crafted an unerring picture, inhabited by gentle humor and keen insight and emotional beats that run the gamut of gut-wrenching to uplifting. It's Gauri and Sridevi's potent shoutout to the hope and the dream of the Indian woman as a figure that retains dignity and is respected and cherished and treated as a peer. And who can make a kickass plate of ladoo.
What I have is the 2-disc set. Disc 1 has the feature presentation (English sub-titles available). Disc 2 has the following bonus material (totaling 00:24:19 minutes):
3 Deleted Scenes (no English sub-titles)
Behind the Scenes Look (partly in English)
Gauri Shinde's no dialogue first short film, "Oh Man!" (2001), in which a man isn't happy with his woman's provocative wardrobe
Censor Certificate Trailer (really cute!)
Theatrical TrailerThis is a very quiet movie that makes a huge impact on those who watch it. I love Bollywood movies and love that this was actually a heroine focused movie which isn't as common in Bollywood movies as it is in Hollywood movies.
From the beginning we meet Shashi, who is a wife and mother of two children (girl and boy), she also makes ladoos and sells them to those around her neighborhood. I've never had ladoos, but I'm dying to try one now! Her husband is very dismissive of her and we see that when she mispronounces an English word, we also see this dismissiveness when she calls him to tell him how many ladoos she sold that day and he says he is busy and can't talk to her. From the title of the movie we can tell that Shashi has a problem with English. She must go to her daughter's PTA meeting and bumbs into a mother of her daughter's friend, who begins to talk to her in English. Shashi just nods her head and her daughter jumps into the conversation. This gives us a glimpse that she is not fluent in English and that her daughter is embarrassed by this fact. After the PTA meeting we see Shashi's daughter being rude to her for not knowing English and talking to her teacher in Hindi. It is heartbreaking to she Shashi start to cry a little on the ride back to the house. We can see how lonely she is and how her family pays her little respect. It seems her only joy comes from making her sweets which is her solace from her family.
Then the call comes from Shashi's sister who lives in New York, to tell that her eldest daughter is getting married to an American. Her husband decides that Shashi will go a few weeks ahead of the family to help her sister with the preparations. Shashi is very upset with this decision since she does not know English or how to get around, but her husband doesn't seem too concerned that he is sending his wife to an entirley different country than her own. I admire that she does get on the plane to go to America, that takes a lot of courage to go to a country where you do not know the langugae. The scene on the plane, where Amitabh Bachchan is her seat mate, is extremely funny, as he translates the English movie to Hindi for her. Laugh out loud fun! When she gets to New York disaster is soon to follow when Shashi's niece takes her to a park to wait for her to get done with her classes for the day. Shashi deciedes to go to a cafe for some food. The cashier is rude and frustrated that Shashi doesn't speak English and the end result is Shashi without lunch and in tears on a bench.
After this moment she decides to learn English and she enrolls in a four week course. She ends up having to get to the Language Center all by herself, and I admire that she was determined to do it. The scenes of her learning English with the other students is very sweet and funny, and I love the teacher who is very eccentric. There are some very sweet moments between Shashi and the other students as they all struggle to learn this complicated langugae. We can see Shashi becoming more and more confident as the classes go on, and she enjoys this new part of her life. But it is cut short when her family arrives early for the wedding and she is not able to go to the last couple of classes. After an important scene (I won't say what happens) she becomes very upset with herself for putting so much focus on her English lessons when that was not the reason for her being there. She feels that she has failed as a mother for forgetting her responsibilities. I won't give the rest of the movie away but it is beautiful.
What I find wonderful about this movie is how many lessons can be learned from it. I think this movie encourages us to look at how we are treating those who are close to us. We are hurt when Shashi is put down by her family, and it makes us take a look at our own life and see who we may be putting down unecessarily. I think this movie also encourages us to do things we are scared of doing. Shashi is terrified by New York, and by learning English, but she does it and it gives her confidence to stand up for herself. As a native-English speaker this movie helped me realize that English is not easy to learn, and it is very hard to foriegners who are new to America. We see Shashi try to figure out how the langugae works, and we watch her struggle to get around New York and around with people who she cannot communicate with. It helped me realize that being in a completely different country and culture is extremely hard if you are not used to it.
Sridevi had a spectacular performance for not having acted in 15 years. She is stunning as Shashi. The emotions she portrays break our hearts and make us smile as we watch her grow in this foriegn country. She is a brilliant actress who embodies her characters fully. This character was made for her.
This is a non-traditional Bollywood movie but it is no less than those movies with dancing and singing. It it a beautiful story of a woman truely figuring herself out in this new world. It is one of those movies that everyone should see, not just those who love Bollywood movies. Please watch this spectacular movie!
No comments:
Post a Comment