Geeta Malik’s India Sweets and Spices takes place in an affluent New Jersey suburb over the course of one recent summer, when Alia Kapur (Sophia Ali of Grey’s Anatomy fame) comes home from her freshman year of hard work at UCLA (straight As, making it onto the Dean’s list), intending to relax in her parents’ […]
Looking for a Lady with Fangs and a Moustache
In Khyentse Norbu’s latest film, Looking for a Lady with Fangs and a Moustache, a man’s grief over the loss of his sister (we don’t know how recently she died, or how far in the past) triggers his own existential crisis. Tenzin (Tsering Tashi Gyalthang), a Tibetan in Kathmandu, is in the process of scouting […]
The Personal History of David Copperfield
As cinemas reopen in the U.S. after months of COVID closures, if ever there was a movie to watch on the big screen, Armando Ianucci’s The Personal History of David Copperfield is it. This bustling, vibrant two-hour adaptation of Charles Dickens massive novel felt like a wonderful escape from being shut-in, locked down and cut […]
Super Deluxe: A Samsonite stuffed to bursting point
Take one statuesque transgender absentee father, a would-be godman reborn from the sea, a former porn actress and devoted mother, four horny teenage boys, a film-savvy loan shark, one unfaithful newlywed wife and her cuckolded husband of six months, a very, VERY bad cop, one firecracker of a young son, oh yes, AND a cadaver […]
Puzzle
This is not a small film, but perhaps it will sound like that. Compared to the mega superhero franchises releasing during these stifling, muggy months, Puzzle may seem small by comparison. It’s quiet and gentle, even as it explores one woman’s major reassessment of her life thus far, as she steps beyond the strictures and […]
Viceroy’s House
When I learned of Gurinder Chadha’s next release, Viceroy’s House, I was pleased at the prospect of such a talented cast (Om Puri, Simon Callow, Michael Gambon, Hugh Bonneville), but I was also wary. First, for attempting this topic on film (as opposed to a mini-series) – it’s such a complex, sprawling story, how to […]