Comments on: The Art Behind ‘The Namesake’

By: tamasha

tamasha — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:55:52 +0000

Check out Ashima's sari when the family is visiting the Taj. It's like a deconstructed Indian flag.

By: Jaymed

Jaymed — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 03:43:05 +0000

What did I miss about this movie? Was there some deep philosophical revelation hidden somewhere? Saw it last night and just barely kept awake.

By: Tdot

Tdot — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 20:08:02 +0000

Although parts of 'Namesake' were aesthetically pleasing, overall, I found the film to be inert and plodding. Nair's actors are up to the task and her production designer(s) definitely create the setting but she seems to treat the material with too much reverance, simply letting her actors sit there and act out the words on the page. There's none of the pacing, crispness or flair we've seen in her previous works.

Another quibble I had was with Sooni Taraporevala's script which I thought was lazy and uninspired, simply regurgitated Jhumpa Lahiri's novel in screenplay form. The novel is supposed to be source material, not a que for the screenwriter to cut and paste dialogue and scenes verbatim.

I like Mira Nair and will always watch anything she puts out but I'm still waiting for her to make a film that combines the scope and storytelling ability she showed in 'Salaam Bombay' with the visual sophistication and insight of her 'Hysterical Blindness'.

By: Floridian

Floridian — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 21:20:21 +0000

Amardeep #52: "Floridian, your comments on "tradition" in The Namesake are intriguing, especially the slippage from "tradition" in Eliot's sense to "tradition" in the Desi parent's, "why don't you marry a nice Bengali girl" sense."

I thought I was being quite consistent with "tradition" in Eliot's sense. The literary tradition behind "The Namesake" is the genre of "transplanted culture" stories that Nair herself had done so brilliantly before, as did Amy Tan and Gurinder Chadha, who happens to be my favorite. I saw "Bhaji on the Beach" again recently, and it still felt edgy.

I apologize for attributing "Bend it Like Beckham" to Nair. I had a memory lapse.

Amy Tan does seem dated now but when she first appeared on the scene, her stuff was as fresh as Lahiri's. It goes to show that a genre alone does not guarantee an author a long shelf life. The work has to stand on its own legs.

By: Filmiholic

Filmiholic — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 21:00:08 +0000

Floridian, I wanted to chime in on the chicken-and-egg part of this discussion, and Amardeep's comments on the photographic influences that Mira Nair pointed to, when the film was released in NY last year, there was also an exhibition called Namesake/Inspiration at a gallery here.

I don't have the little guide from it handy right now, but I do recall some quote/s of MN there saying how these pictures had inspired her work on the film. (The above URL is a link to my account of the opening night, with Ms. Nair, Tabu, and Irrfan Khan all in attendance.)

Happy 2008, y'all.

By: Yogi

Yogi — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 17:06:34 +0000

Maybe I was expecting too much after Monsoon Wedding.

Loved monsoon wedding, Namesake not so much. Irfan Khan and Tabu were amazing, faux accents and all. The older couple's journey, their struggles felt more compelling, their story more captivating. Gogol and Moushumi's trials and tribulations on the other hand felt self inflicted and ultimately uninteresting. I could care less what happened to them by the end of the movie.

By: dipanjan

dipanjan — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 09:35:44 +0000

Did anyone here have problems with the faux-Bengali accents of Tabu & Irfan?

Yes.

By: nala

nala — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 07:40:15 +0000

too much due diligence puts closing the deal at risk

Touche.

By: tipu

tipu — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 07:20:59 +0000

Did anyone here have problems with the faux-Bengali accents of Tabu & Irfan? I have never heard a Bengali speak like that. It distracted me so much I couldn't enjoy the movie. Being a Calcutta-born Bengali myself, this was a movie I desperately wanted to like ever since I read Joe Morgenstern's review in the WSJ after he saw it at the 2006 Telluride film festival, & later saw the trailer. That meandering script, sentences that take an eternity to complete & juxtaposing the Brooklyn Bridge (?) with Howrah Bridge every few minutes didn't help either.

But my American friends who have seen it loved it. Go figure. Maybe I was expecting too much after Monsoon Wedding.

By: Manju

Manju — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 07:14:10 +0000

55 Â· nala said

I hope that everyone involved had liabilities checked first.

too much due diligence puts closing the deal at risk