ALLAN HUNTER at the Movies

IT IS FOUR years since Monica Ali’s novel Brick Lane won hearts and minds as it vividly conveyed a young Bangladeshi woman’s journey of self-discovery in modern London.

No filmmaker could hope to do justice to such a wide-ranging, emotionally resonant work of fiction but it is a disappointment that the screen version of the bestseller simplifies and diminishes the story until it becomes a Shirley Valentine-style account of a stifling marriage, impossible love and female empowerment.

Brick Lane remains touching and involving largely thanks to a warm, graceful central performance from Tannishtha Chatterjee as Nazneen. A stoical woman who has chosen to accept her fate, Nazneen devotes herself to her daughters and husband Chanu (Satish Kaushik), a buffoon of a man hopelessly deluded about his status in the world.

Sleepwalking through her life, Nazneen takes refuge in memories of happy days with her sister in the village where they were born. Things begin to change when her eye is drawn to Karim (Christopher Simpson), a handsome young man who becomes increasingly radicalised as the Muslim community are victimised.

The political edge to Brick Lane is fairly modest and the film works best as a love story with Nazneen caught in a Brief Encounter-style dilemma of whether to risk her marriage and self-esteem for the allure of another man.

Frequently shown in loving close-ups, Chatterjee effectively captures all the moods of Nazneen, with a sharp withering look able to convey all her intense frustration of a woman who has spent half a lifetime a virtual prisoner in a world she never wanted.

The emotion is her performance makes Nazneen an intensely sympathetic character and ensures that the film is always watchable if not the classic many people had expected.

Director: Sarah Gavron
Stars: Tannishtha Chatterjee, Satish Kausik, Christopher SImpson, Lalita Ahmed, Naemma Begum, Harsh Nayyar
Screenwriter: Laura Jones, Abbi Morgan based on the novel by Monica Ali
Certificate: 15
Running time: 102 mins
Country: UK
Year: 2007