To attempt to fully describe what director Mira Nair has created with Monsoon Wedding is not the easiest of tasks. The 2001 film, shot by Declan Quinn with a script from Sabrina Dhawan, is the tale of the wedding of the only daughter of a Punjabi family in Delhi. As with so much of Nair's work, the film neither lies wholly within the rubric of Western filmmaking, but nor can it be placed squarely into the category of Indian film either. Instead, Nair manages to take elements from both, creating a film which, though shot in a mere 30 days and very inexpensively, is brilliant, and which now has a Criterion Collection edition.
Monsoon Wedding centers itself on a father, Lalit Verma (Naseeruddin Shah), as he prepares for the wedding of his only daughter, Aditi (Vasundhara Das). Though Lalit has only a small immediate family, as one would expect, he has a massive extended family, all of whom descend upon his house for this occasion. Nair attempts, quite successfully, to tell a number of the different stories that take place within the family, and while she leaves a lot of loose threads hanging by the closing credits, one still walks away from the film with a great sense that the events (film and wedding) have worked out wonderfully.
The bride's story revolves around the fact that not only has Aditi never actually met her betrothed and not only does he live in Houston with the intent of taking her back there following the wedding, but also that she has been having an affair with her boss who just happens to be married. Although her specific issues are not at the heart of the film, Nair is able to use them to examine and discuss the norm/tradition in India and how it is changing, and perhaps not for the better.
In fact, watching the film, one gets the sense that every storyline that appears does so with the specific intent of raising a larger issue – perhaps not taking a stand on the issue, but at the very least raising it. One of the most compelling stories told is that of the burgeoning love between PK Dubey (Vijay Raaz), the wedding planner, and Alice (Tillotama Shome), the Vermas' housekeeper. Dubey initially seems to only appear for comic effect, but between quick glances, slightly longer looks, a few brief words, and facial expressions, Nair is able to build their love story through the course of the film, to the point where it becomes a far more engrossing love story than that of Aditi and her betrothed, Hemant Rai (Parvin Dabas).
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1 - Tall Writer
Can't wait to own this one...it's been so long since I've seen it, but I've definitely been listening to the amazing soundtrack since watching this masterpiece at BGSU's Gish Theater. :-)