You might wonder whether the polished looking wife of a corporate executive could really be unable to speak a few words in English. You might wonder if it’s possible for a software professional working in the USA to have acquired the necessary credentials for his job with so poor a grasp of the language that he has to join an English coaching class. You might wonder why, if someone had to meet their family near the Empire State Building in New York, they would wait near Columbus Circle, 34 blocks away.
If you’re the type to wonder about these things, then English Vinglish isn’t your kind of movie. But if you’re used to happily suspending disbelief to the extent required to enjoy a Bollywood flick, this film will make far fewer demands on you on that front.
English Vinglish, which had its world premiere at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, is billed as the comeback vehicle of Sridevi who reigned as a top heroine first in Tamil cinema and then in Hindi films until the late 1990s.
She looks like she simply skipped 15 years of ageing.
Sridevi is Shashi, the wife of an executive and mother of a teenage daughter and young son, as well as an entrepreneur with a snack-catering business run out of her kitchen in Pune. Her husband appreciates her cooking but shows little respect for her business, while the daughter is embarrassed by her mother’s inability to speak English, as she reminds her often and in the casually cruel way that only a teenager can.
Shashi’s feelings of inadequacy multiply when she has to travel alone to New York to help prepare for her niece’s wedding, with her husband and kids scheduled to join her a few weeks later. But once in New York, where most of the film is set, she discovers an English coaching class, and a world of new friendships and respect opens up.
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But this is not just a film about a woman learning English; it’s about her quest for self-confidence and respect and her determination to earn it. Shashi is not a doormat, she just needs her family to know it too. When her husband suggests early on that she give up her laddoo-making business, she fires back that it’s the one thing that gives her satisfaction.
Her feistiness is conveyed ably by Sridevi who in fact communicates best when she’s not talking. Her discomfort at conversing with a fellow parent at her daughter’s school; her hurt at the frequent put-downs by her daughter and husband; her panic on discovering that ordering a sandwich and coffee in New York can involve decisions relating to varieties of bread, fillings, milk fat content and labour practices of coffee-growing countries; her gratitude for acts of kindness from strangers — the emotions dance across her face, all captured lovingly by the camera.
The real surprise here is not that Sridevi is supposed to have trouble speaking English, it’s that her Hindi doesn’t sound particularly natural or accent-free given her long career in Bollywood. The stilted lines she often has to deliver don’t help.
First-time director Gauri Shinde says this film is an ode to her own mother and to her favourite city, New York. She captures the Big Apple’s frenetic energy perfectly in the track “Manhattan”, which also seemingly namechecks every designer brand and Starbucks beverage. She also captures a slice of New York life in the scenes on commuter trains and stations even if Shashi’s route to and from Manhattan may seem implausible to those familiar with the city.
But that’s the least of the film’s weaknesses. The English class feels like a bad remake of the 1980s British sitcom Mind Your Language, with clichéd characters from Pakistan and Mexico, a Chinese girl, a Frenchman, and the gay teacher, among others. French actor Mehdi Nebbou, who has appeared in films like Munich and Body of Lies, plays the French cook Laurent who wants to be Shashi’s romantic diversion.
And why not, considering it’s hard to summon much sympathy for her husband, who seems so self-centred that even after he discovers what his wife has managed to achieve alone in New York can only react by asking if she still loves him.
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The film has its highlights, chief among them Amitabh Bachchan’s cameo, which leaves us wanting more of him. One of the most endearing moments comes when an American immigration officer asks Sridevi to look into a camera and she reflexively adds a half-namaste as she looks up; she said in Toronto that it was a spur of the moment idea.
The title track is catchy and the visuals are glossy, whether in Pune or in New York.
It’s not exactly a spoiler to disclose that all ends well after some obligatory heart tugging moments. Although it’s ironic that Shashi’s big speech at the end, delivered in her newly acquired English, might be inaccessible to her erstwhile club of Vinglish speakers.
