Barnes & Noble

The marriage of Indian culture and family drama make for gratifying entertainment in Monsoon Wedding, the art-house hit from director Mira Nair (Salaam Bombay!). The colorful story -- think reds and oranges -- concerns a high-strung father, Lalit (Naseeruddin Shah), planning the arranged marriage of his daughter Aditi (Vasundhara Das) amid a flurry of chaos and catharsis. The bride-to-be's feet are on the cold side, as she still isn't over her affair with a married man. Meanwhile, Adit's cousin Ria (Shefali Shetty) feels the stress of being older and unwed. With dashes of both Robert Altman and John Cassavetes, Nair deftly handles a hodgepodge of characters, while the docudrama feel of her active handheld camera lends realism to the proceedings. Much like Ang Lee's The Wedding Banquet, Monsoon Wedding offers a glimpse of Eastern culture but also transcends it with universal family themes. Sublime touches of Bollywood sentimentality serve as the frosting on this multi-tiered cake. Especially delicious is the romantic subplot involving one the family's servants (Tilotama Shome) and the wedding planner (Vijay Raaz), who has a penchant for eating marigolds. Not quite a musical, but with a noticeably festive soundtrack, Monsoon Wedding is not only the perfect blending of Indian and American independent cinema but a sweet and emotionally honest story as well. Stuart Gazzo

All Movie Guide

Following up on her controversial erotic drama Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love, Mira Nair directs this charming family drama about a very chaotic Indian wedding. Lalit Verma (Naseeruddin Shah) is a wealthy father who is trying to see that his daughter Aditi's wedding goes off without a hitch. Though familiar with Western ways, he has little patience with them and is dead set on seeing the nuptials done properly and traditionally. Disillusioned with her long time relationship with Vikram -- a man who is almost twice her age -- Aditi (Vasundhara Das) suddenly agrees to submit to an arranged marriage with Hemant, an engineer from Houston. Yet as the ceremony nears, she gets cold feet and returns to see her former lover -- even though it could spell disaster for everyone involved. Meanwhile, Aditi's comely 17-year-old cousin Ayesha is coming to terms with her blossoming sexuality and has her sights set on Rahul, another relative who is a college student in Australia. Then there is Rai -- also Aditi's cousin -- who has a shocking revelation to make. This film was screened at the 2001 Toronto and Venice Film Festivals. At Venice, Monsoon Wedding won the prestigious Golden Lion award. Jonathan Crow

Entertainment Weekly

The old-world-meets-new mesh is incarnated in the movie's soundtrack, a joyful effusion of disco Bollywood that, by the end of Monsoon Wedding, sent my spirit soaring out of the theater. Owen Gleiberman

Chicago Sun-Times

1/2
Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding is one of those joyous films that leaps over national boundaries and celebrates universal human nature. Roger Ebert

Product Details

• UPC: 715515049214
• Source: CRITERION
• Region Code: A
• Presentation: Wide Screen
• Sound: DTS 5.1-Channel Surround Sound, Dolby AC-3 Surround Sound
• Language: English
• Editions: Special Edition
• Time: 1:54:00
• Sales Rank: 4,981

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