While Bollywood is the best-known branch of Indian cinema, it’s
not the only one. The Tamil film industry, centered in Madras, is one
of the larger and more successful of the regional cinemas; Aishwarya Rai
debuted in the Tamil industry, and she’s just one of the many big
Bollywood stars that regularly cross back and forth between Madras and
Bombay. All of which brings me to Kandukondain Kandukondain (2001), easily the best musical Jane Austen adaptation starring Aishwarya Rai I’ve seen all month.
This time around, the plot is lifted from Sense and Sensibility, and, like Bride and Prejudice, the film updates the setting to contemporary India, while remaining very true to the spirit of the story and characters. This time, though, all the sisters make it into the film intact.
Sowmya (Tabu), the older sister, is the sensible one. She’s mature, levelheaded, and the backbone of the family, both emotionally and financially, thanks to her job as a computer teacher and acting principal at the local college. She’s also generally considered unlucky (in the “Stay away, she’s cursed” sense, not the “That’s too bad” sense) because her fiancé died before marriage. The second sister, Meenakshi (Aishwarya Rai), is anything but sensible; a talented singer, she’s convinced that one day a man who loves art and music and poetry as much as she does will appear suddenly to sweep her off her feet and make her happy forever and all of that lovely stuff. Kamala (Shamili), the youngest sister, is an interesting and well-written character in her own right, but since she’s too young for a romantic subplot, I won’t be mentioning her again for the rest of the review. The family live on the estate of the sisters’ grandfather, who has been bedridden and unable to speak for years. This will be important later, but I don’t want it to come as a surprise.
Sowmya has had a few suitors since the death of her fiancé, but they’ve all rejected her because of the whole “unlucky” thing. While waiting for yet another potential suitor, she opens the door to find Manohar (Ajith), a production assistant scouting for locations for the film he’s working on. She thinks he’s an aspiring groom, he thinks he’s asking about filming in the house, and wackiness ensues (in a scene I found very funny.) When the truth is revealed, both parties are very embarrassed, but Manohar is also a little smitten, and begins a low-key courtship of the reluctant Sowmya. Eventually, they reach an understanding; they will marry after he has directed his first film. Manohar promptly leaves town in order to make that dream come true.
Meanwhile, Meenakshi has unwittingly attracted the affections of Major Bala, an embittered alcoholic war veteran who manages a flower farm just outside of town. Bala cleans up his life, befriends the family, and encourages Meenakshi’s musical talent, but before he can bring himself to make a romantic overture, she is literally swept off her feet by Srikanth (Abbas), a poetry-spouting celebrity businessman who happens to be passing through town. Meenakshi and Srikanth are soon madly in love, but when his business runs into trouble, he has to leave town in order to save it.
Remember poor, bed-ridden Grandpa? He dies, and that’s where the trouble really begins. When his daughter married without his permission, he drew up a will that left everything (including the house, and the college Sowmya teaches at) to his son. She and her daughters had been caring for him during the entire length of his illness, while his son never visited once, but because he wasn’t able to communicate, he wasn’t able to change the will. The brother arrives just in time to claim the massive inheritance. At first, he fully intends to take care of his sister and nieces, but his greedy wife has other ideas. Sowmya loses her position as acting principal, and she and her family are gradually squeezed out of their home and left to fend for themselves.
They wind up in Madras, and in what may be the single greatest deviation from the original text in any Jane Austen adaptation ever, they all go out and get jobs. The mother finds work in the kitchen of a hotel. Sowmya takes a position as a receptionist at a computer company. and when Major Bala manages to track the family down, he helps Meenakshi find a job as a playback singer. While no one is exactly happy, the family manages to build a new life for themselves, and gain a degree of peace. A peace that is quickly shattered when Manohar and Srikanth reappear.
While it’s not likely to change the world, and it won’t win any awards for originality, Kandukondain Kandukondain is a well-crafted, entertaining film. The characters are well-written, well-acted, and mostly likeable, the dance numbers are frequent and lavish (including a cameo appearance by those Star Trek aliens who are half black and half white), everybody winds up with the right person in the end, all the sub-plots get the screen time they deserve, and the film is often very funny without resorting to cheap physical comedy. While the ladies are busy suffering we see quite a bit of Manohar’s efforts to make his “original” film (a Speed rip-off), and I was quite amused even though I missed 90% of the Tamil cinema in-jokes and cameos. (I did spot Kali’s #1 fan from Devi Maa, but that’s about it.)
Meenakshi has a more extreme character arc here than Lalita does in Bride and Prejudice, and Aishwarya’s performance is more impressive. She’s captivating throughout, while still remaining true to the growth f the character. As good as she is, though, Tabu is better; her Sowmya has a tremendous inner strength and serenity, making the moment when her reserve finally breaks all the more impressive.
As much as I enjoyed the film, though, I do have to complain about the subtitles on the DVD. They were awful. The phrasing was awkward, they sometimes flew past too quickly, and by the end of the film they were at least 45 seconds behind the spoken dialogue. (Major Bala’s last line in the film was great, but it would have been funnier if I hadn’t had to wait for the punchline.) Normally, bad subtitling isn’t a huge issue for me; while I don’t speak Hindi, I’ve absorbed enough vocabulary to understand the context of any given scene. I don’t know any Tamil, though, and the language seems a bit faster paced than Hindi as well. Luckily, I do know my Jane Austen, so I wasn’t too confused, but proper subtitling would have been better.
This time around, the plot is lifted from Sense and Sensibility, and, like Bride and Prejudice, the film updates the setting to contemporary India, while remaining very true to the spirit of the story and characters. This time, though, all the sisters make it into the film intact.
Sowmya (Tabu), the older sister, is the sensible one. She’s mature, levelheaded, and the backbone of the family, both emotionally and financially, thanks to her job as a computer teacher and acting principal at the local college. She’s also generally considered unlucky (in the “Stay away, she’s cursed” sense, not the “That’s too bad” sense) because her fiancé died before marriage. The second sister, Meenakshi (Aishwarya Rai), is anything but sensible; a talented singer, she’s convinced that one day a man who loves art and music and poetry as much as she does will appear suddenly to sweep her off her feet and make her happy forever and all of that lovely stuff. Kamala (Shamili), the youngest sister, is an interesting and well-written character in her own right, but since she’s too young for a romantic subplot, I won’t be mentioning her again for the rest of the review. The family live on the estate of the sisters’ grandfather, who has been bedridden and unable to speak for years. This will be important later, but I don’t want it to come as a surprise.
Sowmya has had a few suitors since the death of her fiancé, but they’ve all rejected her because of the whole “unlucky” thing. While waiting for yet another potential suitor, she opens the door to find Manohar (Ajith), a production assistant scouting for locations for the film he’s working on. She thinks he’s an aspiring groom, he thinks he’s asking about filming in the house, and wackiness ensues (in a scene I found very funny.) When the truth is revealed, both parties are very embarrassed, but Manohar is also a little smitten, and begins a low-key courtship of the reluctant Sowmya. Eventually, they reach an understanding; they will marry after he has directed his first film. Manohar promptly leaves town in order to make that dream come true.
Meanwhile, Meenakshi has unwittingly attracted the affections of Major Bala, an embittered alcoholic war veteran who manages a flower farm just outside of town. Bala cleans up his life, befriends the family, and encourages Meenakshi’s musical talent, but before he can bring himself to make a romantic overture, she is literally swept off her feet by Srikanth (Abbas), a poetry-spouting celebrity businessman who happens to be passing through town. Meenakshi and Srikanth are soon madly in love, but when his business runs into trouble, he has to leave town in order to save it.
Remember poor, bed-ridden Grandpa? He dies, and that’s where the trouble really begins. When his daughter married without his permission, he drew up a will that left everything (including the house, and the college Sowmya teaches at) to his son. She and her daughters had been caring for him during the entire length of his illness, while his son never visited once, but because he wasn’t able to communicate, he wasn’t able to change the will. The brother arrives just in time to claim the massive inheritance. At first, he fully intends to take care of his sister and nieces, but his greedy wife has other ideas. Sowmya loses her position as acting principal, and she and her family are gradually squeezed out of their home and left to fend for themselves.
They wind up in Madras, and in what may be the single greatest deviation from the original text in any Jane Austen adaptation ever, they all go out and get jobs. The mother finds work in the kitchen of a hotel. Sowmya takes a position as a receptionist at a computer company. and when Major Bala manages to track the family down, he helps Meenakshi find a job as a playback singer. While no one is exactly happy, the family manages to build a new life for themselves, and gain a degree of peace. A peace that is quickly shattered when Manohar and Srikanth reappear.
While it’s not likely to change the world, and it won’t win any awards for originality, Kandukondain Kandukondain is a well-crafted, entertaining film. The characters are well-written, well-acted, and mostly likeable, the dance numbers are frequent and lavish (including a cameo appearance by those Star Trek aliens who are half black and half white), everybody winds up with the right person in the end, all the sub-plots get the screen time they deserve, and the film is often very funny without resorting to cheap physical comedy. While the ladies are busy suffering we see quite a bit of Manohar’s efforts to make his “original” film (a Speed rip-off), and I was quite amused even though I missed 90% of the Tamil cinema in-jokes and cameos. (I did spot Kali’s #1 fan from Devi Maa, but that’s about it.)
Meenakshi has a more extreme character arc here than Lalita does in Bride and Prejudice, and Aishwarya’s performance is more impressive. She’s captivating throughout, while still remaining true to the growth f the character. As good as she is, though, Tabu is better; her Sowmya has a tremendous inner strength and serenity, making the moment when her reserve finally breaks all the more impressive.
As much as I enjoyed the film, though, I do have to complain about the subtitles on the DVD. They were awful. The phrasing was awkward, they sometimes flew past too quickly, and by the end of the film they were at least 45 seconds behind the spoken dialogue. (Major Bala’s last line in the film was great, but it would have been funnier if I hadn’t had to wait for the punchline.) Normally, bad subtitling isn’t a huge issue for me; while I don’t speak Hindi, I’ve absorbed enough vocabulary to understand the context of any given scene. I don’t know any Tamil, though, and the language seems a bit faster paced than Hindi as well. Luckily, I do know my Jane Austen, so I wasn’t too confused, but proper subtitling would have been better.
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