By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.5 cats
Director: Ritesh Batra
Starring: Bharati Achrekar | Irfan Khan | Lillete Dubey | Nawazuddin Siddiqui | Nimrat Kaur
Original language title: Dabba
Country: france, germany, india, united_states
Year: 2014
Running time: 104
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2350496/combined
Chris says: “This quasi-romance seemingly contains all the right ingredients for an English language remake: appealing leads, the mysterious allure of a missed connection, comic relief from an unseen (but certainly not unheard) neighbor. Fortunately, the one thing preventing such a potentially inferior facsimile is also what gives the film its most distinctive flavor: the titular object. Every morning, men in India known as dabbawallas deliver hot food via lunchboxes from residences to workplaces. Ritesh Batra’s film uses this complex system as its narrative catalyst—what might happen when one lunchbox mistakenly arrives at the wrong address?
“In this case, the lunchbox’s maker is the young-ish Ila (Nimrat Kaur), who takes up cooking in hope of rekindling her stale marriage. Instead of reaching her husband at his work, the food accidentally goes to Saajan (Irfan Khan), a widower one month away from taking early retirement. She realizes her husband did not receive her lunchbox (he only mentions how much he liked the cauliflower, which she did not put in his box), but doesn’t tell him. Instead, she includes a note in the next day’s lunchbox to the mystery recipient. Saajan leaves a reply note in the empty lunchbox sent back to her and an epistolary correspondence between the two ensues, building towards something that’s not exactly a romance, but a mutual affection and understanding
both participants are hesitant to act upon.
“Numerous scenes of dabbawallas making their massive, daily deliveries on foot, bicycle or train lend a documentary feel that no remake could entirely match, even if the lunchbox was to be swapped out with a more universal object. However, what’s best and most surprising about Batra’s film is how charmingly low-key it all is. In the context of Indian cinema, THE LUNCHBOX plays like a contemporary take on the neorealist dramas of Satyajit Ray, displaying similar humaneness towards its characters. For instance, take Shaikh (Nawazuddin Siddiqui), the young man Saajan trains to take over his job upon retirement. Initially he comes off as a one-note goof, but Batra continually introduces new dimensions to him as his relationship with Sajaan naturally evolves from tolerated co-worker to cherished confidant. In some ways a platonic parallel to what develops between Saajan and Ila, it counters that situation’s bittersweet aftertaste by gently reassuring that Saajan can still make an impact on another person’s life and even give himself something to live for. 4.5 cats”