The Namesake

Just recently I read Jhumpa Lahiri’s Pulitzer Prize-winning short story collection, Interpreter of Maladies. She camouflages immigrants’ fascinating explorations of a new country with everyday life and her themes of love, family and relationship do not just apply to immigrants, but can relate universally as well. I liked the book so much that I recommended it to my book club to read. When her novel The Namesake (I have not read this book) was adapted and released on big screen, I eagerly went to see it. It is such a disappointing journey that I hope audience won’t dismiss the author simply based on this movie.

The movie is directed by Mira Nair, one of most accomplished female Indian filmmakers working today. While not a big fan of Kama Sutra, I have thoroughly enjoyed her previous work Monsoon Wedding. Along with Deepa Mehta, they are my two favorite female Indian directors. Both Nair and Mehta help to bring India to American audience’s attention, yet they show us two very different sides of India. They both have deep love for their native country, but Mehta intends to use movies to reveal the dark, ugly side of India that is not well known to outsiders, while Nair likes to showcase the modern, vibrant India and its average citizens for the world to see. So it is not surprising that Nair is attracted to Lahiri’s works. Like Nair, Lahiri’s stories are a tapestry of lives in India.

The Namesake is a story about how an immigrant family tries to integrate into a new country without completely surrendering their native culture. In western civilization, we are quick to dismiss any other culture different from ours as barbarian or backwards. Lahiri, herself born in London and raised in America, does not pass judgment. She merely compares Indian customs with western ones. In her stories and this movie, arranged marriage is not so much as some old-fashioned way of life that should be abolished in this day of age as a viable alternative to our free-to-choose marriage. In The Namesake, there are success and failure in either kind of marriages. Arranged marriage is not synonymous to loveless marriage. Actually love often runs deep in arranged marriages written by Lahiri. Often parents pass their wisdom to their children that will be fully appreciated when they are older, which is the case in this movie. The movie is beautifully shot scene by scene, but unfortunately, it is forever put on a sentimental slow mode to try to jerk some tears out of the audience. It does not have any of the vibrancy that Nair has displayed so well in Monsoon Wedding. The music score is constantly in the background and so overwhelming that it does not give the audience any room to savor any emotions by themselves.

Maybe Lahiri’s books are better read than seen on a big screen. Her stories usually don’t have a big dramatic arc and The Namesake clearly demonstrates it. In the movie, we are misled by the filmmakers to believe there will be some major revelation regarding the son’s name, Gogol, but when the time comes, it is such a letdown and only serves as an anti-climax. Lahiri’s stories are more about subtle feelings than building up any suspense. Nair and screenwriter’s attempt at building any suspense in the plot is truly a waste of time and only becomes terrible clichés. Only briefly Nair brings some excitement on the screen. Right after Gogol’s wedding, Gogol and his bride break into a Bollywood dance number, but the lively entertainment is short-lived and lasts barely a minute. Also either due to Lahiri’s original writing in the book or the screenwriter’s adaptation, the few white characters in the movie are extremely one dimensional, shallow and caricaturized that they do not serve as good counterparts to Gogol’s Indian parents.

The Indian actors who play the parents Ashoke and Ashima have done a wonderful job conveying immigrants’ mixed feelings living in a foreign country. Kal Penn of Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle fame is a questionable casting here. He plays the important role Gogol, yet whenever he is on screen, Kumar just keeps jumping into my mind. He is a terrific comedic actor and maybe I am just being too difficult on him.

Maybe I should have just checked out The Namesake the book and skipped the movie.