Essay on "Understanding Interpretations of Gurinder Chadha's Bride and Prejudice"

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Media and Cultural Studies

Term

Shaoli Rudra

Course Code: 15PMSC002

MA Critical Media and Cultural Studies

Bride and Prejudice is a 2004 film directed by Gurinder Chada and founded on the plotline established by the literary classic, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Bride and Prejudice captivates audiences by putting a modern and cultural spin on the classic, by transforming the settings and genre into a Bollywood style film. By mixing old world England with the modern India, the film attracted an audience ranging from Ludhiana to London to Los Angeles. The film claimed to remain true to Austen's novel by representing most of the original characters in their Indian avatars. The film garnered much media attention and there have been various commentaries concerning the film across different sectors of media based in UK, America and India itself. While there are many different interpretations of the film that have been put forth, this essay seeks to critically examine the reviews from newspapers and review websites based in the United Kingdom, United States and India and will delve into the interpretations offered by them. By doing this, the essay will be in a position of expanding on the idea that interpretations are contextual, interpretations differ are just that because they differ due to individual perspectives and cultural backgrounds that mold viewers. Newspapers and movie production company reviews are being used to illuminate different interpretations of the same subject matter, in this case Bride and Prejudice. Also, the scope of the analysis made in this essay is not restricted to just newspapers

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to ensure a variety of sources.

Before being able to adequately dissect the reviews of this film, it is important to explore the characters and underlying plot structure of the movie, so analysis and interpretations is understood. The story concentrates on the Bakshi family who live in a run-down mansion in Amritsar in India. The domineering Mrs. Bakshi wants nothing other than to see her four daughters married off, starting with Jaya the eldest. When the wealthy Balraj arrives from the United Kingdom with the aim of attending the wedding of his friend, he ends up falling in love with Jaya. Meanwhile, the second Bakshi daughter, the confident Lalita, catches the eye of American Hotelier and Balraj's friend Will Darcy. However, she considers him too proud and his views on India unpalatable. Instead she ends up being charmed by Johnny Wickham, who appears to love everything about India. But as anyone who has read Austen's classic will tell you, Wickham is not the man of honor he appears to be. Lalita also has her hands full avoiding the overtures of the NRI Mr. Kohli, whose thoughts on marriage, wealth and success as well as complete lack of self-awareness adds humor to the story. The film sticks to Austen's original plot and the end sees Lalita and Darcy as well as Balraj and Jaya get married.

Understanding the characters and plot will be in imperative when exploring the reviews on this matter.

Reviews

Set 1: American Media

About.com:

About.com is a website where people from the country can provide commentary about a specific topic. Commentaries are an integral part of understanding how individuals are interpreting the subject matter. In their interpretation, the reader is possibly able to identify and appreciate the commentary by realizing its context in both a cultural and social manner.

This review on About.com's World Film site, dated 27th February 2005, intensely evaluates what makes the components of the movie entertaining. While the dialogue is referred to as 'crackling and laugh-out loud funny', the piece is critical of the film's leading heroine, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan. While she is described as the film's greatest draw, her ability to aptly portray the Indian Elizabeth Bennet is strongly questioned. The review touches upon the fact that as Lalita Bakshi, Rai is more 'demure' than independent and free-thinking aura exuded by her original character, Elizabeth Bennett. In addition to focusing on the actress, the commentator was also critical of the director, Gurinder Chadha's attempt at crossing 'traditional' boundaries and merging cultural elements in the film.

"When the story takes the Bakshis to sunny California, Chadha once again plays with tradition, staging a comical Bollywood production on the beach, casting an entire Gospel choir, enthusiastic surfers, and singing lifeguards." (About.com, 2005)

Though the cultures seem very much unrelated, the commentary approves of the way that Chadha has merged these two seemingly differently cultures. As a byproduct, the feedback also alludes to the idea that India has been romanticized in the process.

"She transplants the traditional tale of manners to colourful India, infusing the tired story with the energy of some rousing dance numbers, bright saris, orange marigolds, magnificent elephants, and the stunning Bollywood star, Aishwarya Rai herself." (About.com, 2005)

Overall, the review portrays the film as one purely meant for entertainment, meant to expose the world to Bollywood style cinema and the plot line was meant to be familiar but not exactly accurate. The author goes on to commentate that:

"Patrons of Hollywood films, not used to Bollywood cinema, will also get a spirited education to the popular genre." (About.com, 2005)

The above excerpt is a macrocosm of something bigger- that this particular commentator sees and appreciates the beauty in educating the viewers on immersing two vastly different cultures together, which is telling of the global and cultural context that the commentator is from.

The SAWF or South Asian Women's Forum:

Contrary to the About.com review which focused more on what worked for the film, the South Asian Women's Forum (SAWF) review, dated 15th February 2005, looked to evaluate what components of film did not work as well. This particular review captured comparisons between the director and his earlier work, and also between the plot and the original Austen novel. Foremost, the author asserted that:

"Gurinder Chadha's Bride & Prejudice, after the much acclaimed Bend it like Beckham, has come as a huge disappointment." (South Asian Women's Forum, 2005)

In this particular review, the film was being compared to another movie that Chadha had directed; but, it is important to note that the above excerpt captures a specific interpretation as some may argue the SAWF conclusion.

In addition to the review's disappointment of the director's work in Bride and Prejudice, the review is also critical when comparing the original work of Jane Austen and the flow of the film:

"Bride and Prejudice is a faithful version of Austen's novel as so far as adhering to the story line of the source material is concerned but Chadha fails to retain the essence of the original work. The film is a flippant interpretation of a masterpiece as the characters are changed into shadowy figures." (South Asian Women's Forum, 2005)

When reviewing the comments that the South Asian Women's Forum makes of the film, it is important to realize that it is a forum made up of South Asian women, some of whom may be of Indian origin. When watching a movie from this South Asian perspective and having and being knowledgeable at a deep cultural context of what an Indian character in an authentic Bollywood movie would be, it would be difficult to suspend one's disbelief and see the connection between the original Austen classic and this modern Indian twist. The perspective that this particular source has may differ from the previous review for those cultural contextual reasons. The previous author, Marcy Dermanksy, believed that the modern and cultural adaptation worked well and found it to be a non-issue- but it begs the question: what is Marcy Dermansky's background? What is her global and cultural context that makes her see and appreciate the movie differently from Deepa Nair of the South Asian Women's forum?

Despite Nair's perspective that the movie does not retain the essence of the original Austen work, Nair does acknowledge the apparent at remaking Pride and Prejudice in an Indian setting.

"Austen's world is not much different from the middle class Indian homes. Like the 18th century England of Austen's novel, the world in Chadha's film is primarily concerned with the question of matrimony. Marriage for Bakshi sisters and their friends offer the sole mode of escape from the small town they were born in. The craze of getting NRI grooms for daughters is also something quite real in India." (South Asian Women's Forum, 2005)

Nair's acknowledgement that there are ties between old world England and modern India do help build the movie back up in light of her previous remarks. Despite some flaws in the movie, after delving into the details, even Nair, a woman of the South Asian perspective, can see the similarities between these two seemingly different mediums. Though Nair was critical at the onset, she shed light on some of the positive things that the movie has accomplished as well. By merging these two perspectives, the negative and the positive, from Nair, the reader is given a more comprehensive understanding of what a woman of South… READ MORE

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Quoted Instructions for "Understanding Interpretations of Gurinder Chadha's Bride and Prejudice" Assignment:

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I had already written this essay but it came back from the teacher and he failed me. I now need it re-written properly. You have helped me out before so I would appreciate a good piece of work this time as well.

My aim with the essay was to use reviews of Gurinder Chadha*****'s film *****'Bride and Prejudice*****' and see what kind of notions/views about India came out through them. This includes ideas about India, what *****'indianness*****' is etc....also whether Gurinder Chadha had any intentions behind making a film like this.

I am attaching my essay (The comments are on it...its in the pages format so if it can be opened with a mac it will be easier to read) Please find below the final comments of my teacher. Please re-write the essay accordingly. Also if the essay can be given to someone with some idea of India it would be appreciated. I will need the ***** to be in constant touch with me.

Teacher*****'s comments:

This essay is rather problematic and is going in a number of different directions at once. You would have found it helpful to have followed my advice when I have urged you all to be clear at the start as to what your precise object of study is and the questions you are going to ask of it. Here the most obvious object is the relationship between the reviews and the subject positions of the reviewers. Then the question could have been: what considerations underlie the divergent representations of a single film, which are represented so differently as to raise questions as to whether everyone was watching the same film? Instead you commit yourself to what Collingwood called *****˜scissors and paste*****, namely trying to extract bits and pieces from the various reviews in the hope that they will tell you something. However, that leaves you with bits and pieces that do not talk to one another nor have any coherent theme. You then jump to Laclau, who is not the obvious author to cite at this point unless you are going to engage in an analysis of antagonisms. However your argument was not set up to examine how the film addresses various antagonisms in Indian society, if indeed it does. So you invoke Laclau on empty signifiers, which is rather strange as you refer to no signifiers in particular. You then land up citing Laclau in a very dense engagement with Derrida on Marx, which seems to come completely out of the sky. Unfortunately, if you had looked carefully at the piece, you would have seen that you have missed the point. This gives the impression that you have cited Laclau without bothering to consider properly the context of the quote, as if you had plucked it out of the air.

Sadly this is a big step backwards from your first essay. You give the impression of having chosen a topic for your project that you were not feeling comfortable about analyzing. If this is the case, you should have said so last term and we would have helped you to choose a topic with which you were happy.

Suggested Mark: 49

*****

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