VARIOUS: "The Namesake" directed by Mira Nair tells the universal story of love, family, and culture
- 00:00:48
- ITN Source
VARIOUS: "The Namesake" directed by Mira Nair tells the universal story of love, family, and culture
She has worked with Hollywood superstars like Denzel Washington and Reese Witherspoon but now Indian-born director Mira Nair is going back to her roots for her most recent and personal film "The Namesake." Nair was born in the eastern Indian state of Orissa in 1957 and left for the United States at the age of 19 after receiving a scholarship from Harvard University. Her debut film, "Salaam Bombay!" (1988) about Mumbai's underbelly, won the Golden Camera Award at the Cannes Film Festival that same year. Some of Nair's critically acclaimed works include "Mississippi Masala" (1991), "Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love" (1996), "Monsoon Wedding" (2001), "Vanity Fair" (2004) and "The Namesake" (2006). Based on the lyrical novel by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jhumpa Lahiri, in "The Namesake" she captures the immigrant experience as well as the sense that first-generation American children of immigrant parents feel of having a foot in two cultures. "Well when I read Jhumpa's (Lahiri's novel) 'Namesake' it was a complete shock of recognition because I happened to read it completely by chance while I was in mourning for my mother in law who had passed away very suddenly, unexpectedly. And I had never had an experience of losing a beloved person and certainly not in country that was not home for her or fully for me. And when I read "The Namesake" it really, Jhumpa understood what that felt like and as well as the fact that the film crossed Calcutta in the '70's which is exactly when I was there as a young person and through New York today which is where I have been for many years," said Nair. The elder Gangulis, who are madly in love after an arranged marriage, are played by Indian actors Irfan Khan and Tabu. Kal Penn, best known as Kumar in "Harold" and "Kumar Go to White Castle", plays their son Gogol Ganguli. The story revolves around Gogol's struggle between remaining true to himself and his dreams while honouring his family members and their hopes for him. He dates an upper-class American girl (Jacinda Barrett) and then marries a sophisticated, Americanized daughter of Bengali parents (Zuleikha Robinson). But his coming of age is not a smooth passage. "I definitely knew that it was about an adult love story. Adults who had married as strangers in Calcutta and then come to this country where they fell in love. So I knew that for the parents I would cast Indian actors, from India, and I cast Tabu and Ifran Kahn who are two big Bollywood stars and amazing actors you know whom I have also known for many years myself. For their son Kal Penn who would play Gogol who I was introduced to by my own fifteen year old. He is someone who has actually lived a life just like Gogol. Born in New Jersey and negotiated what it's like to be a brown person in a sea of white ones you know right from day one," Nair said at an interview in Los Angeles, California. After debuting at several global film festivals, "The Namesake" finally opens to American audiences, on Friday (March 9). Nair's next "challenge" will be directing Johnny Depp in "Shantaram" based on the life story of Gregory David Roberts, whose book of the same name describes his escape from an Australian prison to Mumbai and his adventures with the city's powerful mafia dons.
ITN Source | March 16, 2007
