Dir. Paul Mayeda Berges, 2005, UK, 96mins
Cast: Aishwarya Rai, Dylan McDermott, Nitin Ganatra
Review by Lorna Allen
Ever experienced the burning wrath of a mischievous chilli pepper lurking in an innocuous-looking culinary creation? Well, buddy, that’s nothing compared to the anguish and emotional turmoil our fiery little friends cause our heroine in Paul Mayeda Berges’ directorial debut, The Mistress of Spices, an adaptation of Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s book of the same name.
The Mistress of Spices is a collaboration of the husband-and-wife team behind Bend it Like Beckham and Bride and Prejudice with Berges stepping into the driver’s seat while spouse Gurinder Chadha (who it transpires will be helming the forthcoming big screen Dallas adaptation) co-writes and co-produces.
The film stars former Miss World and Bollywood Queen Aishwarya Rai as Tilo – a young Indian woman, schooled in the ancient and mystical power of the spices, who has relocated to San Francisco to carry out her benevolent duty as agony aunt and emotional healer to a mish-mash of locals, who require guidance and whose ailments she can mysteriously sense. Tilo resides in a musty and aromatic shop selling an array of colourful and exotic wares, blissfully removed from the outside world. Content in her duty to aid the local community, and as servant to the hallowed spices, she is obliged to live by three sacred rules. In return for her powers, Tilo must never leave the store (the impracticality of which is conveniently ignored). She must only use the spices to help others and she must never touch another human’s skin. Then one day she meets handsome architect Doug (McDermott) and, after a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, the whole structure of her restricted lifestyle starts to go to pot and Tilo is forced to confront her past and her suppressed desires. Should she break the rules and pursue her own happiness? If so, what will be the risk to those she is supposed to help? What are the dreaded chillies going to do to her?
This is the crux of this modern fable which is consistent with the themes highlighted in Chadha’s previous works, Bhaji on the Beach and Bend it Like Beckham, which feature young women struggling to find a balance between the old and the new influences in their lives. The film reflects a conflicted sense of identity torn between the traditions and beliefs of one’s homeland and the values of modern Western culture within the parameters of the ‘New World’ – this time Oakland, California. When Tilo totally disregards her past traditions in favour of free will, all sense of order is lost.
Off the cuff, I must admit I found myself stifling laughter each time a foreboding close-up of a menacing bunch of chillies (repeatedly) dominated the screen – accompanied by heavy percussion. These - what are they? - vegetables take on a life of their own as the villain, or strict authority figure, of the film (kind of like Don Corleone or the dad in Dirty Dancing). Some cheesy dialogue in the increasingly irritating voiceover grated somewhat and prompted the same uncomfortable, embarrassed giggles when Tilo decides to throw caution to the wind all ‘for one night with Doug’ – a man with whom I got little sense she shared any real chemistry. However, I must be fair to the film and place it in the context/genre in which it belongs. The Mistress of Spices is a work of magical realism – not placing it in this specific ‘literary mode’ is doing it a disservice whereby it just becomes a risible affair. More commonly associated with literature, ‘magical realism’ challenges polar opposites – in this case, the traditions of India versus the modernity of America. In a modern setting, this ‘genre’ or mode of representation contains fantastical elements and incorporates folklore and legend. So this kind of explains the scary, omnipresent and, I must say, rather spiteful produce in Tilo’s store.
Ironically, in my initial misreading of this film lies the film’s ‘thesis’ – indicated by the literary mode which Berges has used to tell this modern fable. The film highlights the different ways in which different cultures perceive reality. Where I scoffed at the fantastic elements of The Mistress of Spices as nonsense, other viewers may shake their heads at my lack of understanding and appreciation of the spiritual world. As literary professor Jane Anderson Jones summarises: “the intersect of these different world views is magical realism’’.
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