Film Review - Mississippi Masala

Hey..I have never done this before though always wished to. So, I finally decided to do it-write a movie review.. i also tried rating it..It's fun actually.But coming back to the movie that's to be reviewed by the "great Mr. Reddy",Mississippi Masala was Mira Nair's second after her oscar nominated Masterpiece Salaam Bombay!. I had very little knowledge about Nair's work during my growing up days, except for her erotic drama Kama Sutra, which came out in 1996. Strange though, since Kama sutra can easily be singled out as Nair's weakest work. It was much later that I got to know about Nair's real callibre, about her first movie Salaam Bombay and of course its follow-up Mississippi Masala. With a cast comprising of American(mostly black), Indian and some Ugandan actors, Mississippi.. tells the tale of a Ugandan born Indian named Jay, who , along with wife Kindu and daughter Meena, is forced to quit Uganda,following its then dictaor Idi Amin's orders for all Indians to evacuate the country. The family finds shelter in Greenwood, Mississippi. The growing up for Meena in Mississipi was never to be simple. With conservative Parents and their extended indian family in Mississippi on one hand , and the rest of Greenwood, which has more blacks than the native whites and a culture so alien to indians, Meena tries to adapt to both the worlds. However, when she falls in love with the local carpet cleaner, Demetrius(Washington), things only get more complicated.

There have been stories on cross cultural clashes and interracial prejudices. But what sets Mississippi.. apart from the rest is that the romance takes place between people who belong to races, which are pretty much simlar in terms of the colour of their people and the kind of discrimination they have been subjected to from the the "superior" race - whites. But still, all hell breaks loose when Meena's conservative family learns about their daughter's affair with a black man. Demetrius is almost ostracized within his own community. There are interesting hypocrisies that are brought out here. Meena's father(Jay) wants to go back to Uganda and live with the native blacks of that country;but at the same time finds it difficult to accept that his daughter is trying to elope with a black guy. All this Nair does, without being preachy. In fact, there are some very funny moments, mostly arising out of the immigrant indians' way of things in an alien land.

Roshan Seth, who plays Meena's father Jay, is perfectly cast for the role of a man stuck between his desire to go back to Uganda and his own family turmoil.It's a pity we get to see so little of this great actor.Denzel Washington, who had just won an academy award for his performance in "Glory" the previous year, couldnt have been more natural here. Sharmila Tagore, as Meena's pseudo-orthodox mother, is a welcome surprise.Although a fine actress,