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Monsoon Wedding

Generally favorable reviews
Based on 36 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 45 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Romance
Written by: Sabrina Dhawan
Directed by: Mira Nair
Release Date:
Theatrical: February 22, 2002
DVD: September 24, 2002
Running Time: 114 minutes, Color
Origin: India / USA / France / Italy
Language(s): English, Punjabi and Hindi (with English subtitles)
Summary
RATING: R for language, including some sex related dialogue
Starring Naseeruddin Shah, Lillete Dubey, Shefali Shetty, Vijay Raaz, Tilotama Shome, Vasundhara Das, Parvin Dabas, and Kulbhushan Kharbanda
This exuberant ensemble comedy links the stories of far-flung family members, their servants and secret lovers as a Punjabi family in Delhi reunites for their daughter's wedding. (USA Films)
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Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
New York Post Jonathan Foreman
Sheer delight. An ensemble comedy-drama that recalls Robert Altman's best work.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer
Contains an incest story line that's disturbing but shouldn't scare people away. Nair handles the subject with such grace and sensitivity that it becomes just another element in this complex celebration of family.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
The old-world-meets-new mesh is incarnated in the movie's soundtrack, a joyful effusion of disco Bollywood that, by the end of Monsoon Wedding, sent my spirit soaring out of the theater.
Read Full Review >Time Richard Schickel
They bring their characters to good, slightly surprising, quite satisfying places. And leave us beaming happily.
Washington Post Desson Thomson
Nair is not making a caricature out of Lalit or anyone else. She's inviting us into the inner recesses of her culture. And it's both pleasure and privilege to be one of her guests.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Ann Hornaday
Exploding on the screen in a riot of movement, music and color.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan
Has an engaging warmth and an effortless sense of life. It also has an instinct for the humanity and universality of situations that are comic, romantic and quite seriously dramatic by turns.
Read Full Review >Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
Nair's movie, far from being paste, is a string of small, exquisite gems.
USA Today Mike Clark
Some of the movie's best scenes -- knockouts, in fact -- involve musical interludes.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
Delighted me like few films I've seen recently. It's a sexy, sweet, sumptuously entertaining movie about the huge and wildly eventful wedding reception.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
One of those joyous films that leaps over national boundaries and celebrates universal human nature.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Jay Carr
The film's bountiful warmth and gusto do their work. By the end, we feel part of the family, too.
Read Full Review >New Times (L.A.) Jean Oppenheimer
Pulsates with music, dance, color and laughter, but also glows with quiet moments of drama.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Chuck Wilson
Nair, who, in this film as in so many others, aims for the beating heart of the predictable movie moment.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Joshua Rothkopf
A late radical shift in tone, from jittery exuberance to ruinous alienation, strikes an impressive contemporary note amid all the obeisance to custom.
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
When the groom's enormous procession fights its way through the hard rain and muck to the bejeweled bride, Nair's chaos downright sparkles.
Read Full Review >Newsweek David Ansen
Nairs stereotype-shattering movie -- like the polymorphous culture it illuminates -- borrows from Bollywood, Hollywood and cinema verite, and comes up with something exuberantly its own.
Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach
The beauty, vibrancy and complexity of Indian culture is on addictive display in Monsoon Wedding. If only there were more to the film.
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen
It's a fascinating babel, and Nair, using the unfolding ritual of the wedding as a centre point, captures the competing sights and sounds with her own unique mix of cinematic borrowings -- think Robert Altman meets Bollywood.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
With its colorful embroidery, Monsoon Wedding feels pleasurably grounded in a reality about which most Westerners haven't a clue. This may be their only engraved invitation.
Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
In the film's stronger moments, the artist in her definitely seems to be saying that the impulse to retreat into cultural fundamentalism carries dire risks, that much of what is old and traditional needs changing and there are some things about the detested process of globalization that are wonderfully liberating.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
A feast for the eyes and ears as its story is a banquet for the heart.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
Fans of Robert Altman's hit "Gosford Park" will find similar pleasures here: colorful characters, multiple story lines, and clever blends of comedy and drama.
Read Full Review >New York Magazine Peter Rainer
Eminently disposable, but that's its charm. It stays with you just long enough to make you smile.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Punjabi weddings are notorious for their lavishness, and Nair's intoxicating soap opera revels in the sights and sounds of this clamorous family ritual.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Michael Dequina
Strongly infused with an unmistakably exotic Bollywood flair.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Charles Taylor
Monsoon Wedding is going to be a big art-house hit because it's one of those movies that reassures audiences that people in other countries are just like us.
Read Full Review >The New York Times A.O. Scott
The agile handling of the soap-opera elements -- conventional plotting at best -- finally makes "Wedding" a pop, facile take on Capulet versus Montague stuff, likable but square.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian Kim Morgan
Gives just enough to forgive any of its initial flaws and eventually grows on you.
Read Full Review >The New Yorker Anthony Lane
A scruffy, thick-grained piece of work, shot in thirty days and scrawled not with luscious coloring but with the tense and inky markings of a society that is fighting to keep its reputation for togetherness, and wondering what that reputation is still worth. [18 & 25 Feb 2002. p. 199]
Village Voice Michael Atkinson
An air-conditioned bus tour of Punjabi ritual. Nair stuffs the film with dancing, henna, ornamentation, and group song, but her narrative clichés and telegraphed episodes smell of old soap opera.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 7.9 (out of 10) based on 45 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Aby B. gave it a2:
Very predictable story line. Movie is too slow , no clear cuts... Random takes.
Jaspreet S. gave it a10:
One of the most enjoyable movies to come out of india lately. Love that Mir. Dubey.
Timothy D. gave it a10:
A kaleidoscpic blend of elements, the whole surpassing the individual parts. I can understand why parts of the story may have struck some as dog-eared, but it all fit together for me, the movie's energy and spirit (and music!) carrying me from the first frame to the last.
Lance E. gave it a 7:
It's funny how most Indian people are rating this low while non-Indians are rating it very high. I think the problem is (and it's a funny problem), that Indians have seen many movies like this, so it doesn't really stand out in their minds, but for those non-Indians who are exposed to this side of Indian culture for the first time, find it strange and exotic, and because they have seldom, if ever, been exposed to it, find it highly original, better than the average sucky movie Hollywood keeps churning out. I think it's the same thing in India; some probably prefer Hollywood movies there to Bollywood because they're bombarded with sucky Bollywood movies.
Sheetal O. gave it a 9:
The rest of the world finds it practically impossible to understand what it means to be Indian, to be caught between two worlds, two cultures, and as an Indian I can tell you that Monsoon Wedding is the only film ever made that has been able to expose the heart and soul of a beautiful, diverse subcontinent in the process of globalization. This movie gets a definite full score for projecting a realistic image of life in India. The cast and crew have done a fabulous job, and kudos to Shefali Shetty and Naseeruddin Shah for roles played to perfection. Mira Nair is definitely something else and this film deserves every bit of hype it has received. Oh yeah, and the P.K Dubey-Alice affair has got to be one of the most adorable love stories around!!!
Pam C. gave it a 10:
This is a sumptuous, wonderful movie with full characters that draw us into their stories. It is simply told with a light heartedness, tenderness and integrity seldom portrayed. It made my laugh, cry, smile and took my breath away with its beauty.
Sonia M. gave it a 6:
I dont see what the big deal was about this movie. there are other bollywood movies with much better actors/actresses. this thing was slow and boring...
