I saw a trailer for The Mistress of Spices and had to check it out. I read the book by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni awhile ago and had enjoyed it much. I have a thing for magical realism and descriptions that read like poetry.I have mixed feelings about the film. On one hand, some of the visuals were absolutely stunning. These scenes were infused with color and were just radiant. Others were a little less than stellar. Namely the flashbacks. Often times they seemed flat and had that low-budget-made-for-t.v. feel.
Whenever a movie is translated from a book into a film, I am usually surprised at what they decided to keep and what they decided to discard. It really shows what is important to the filmmakers and what's not... which doesn't always mean everyone meets eye to eye. For instance, in the book, the character named Tilo is in the form of an old woman that had been burnt. Having this, I think, makes the relationship between the love interests more interesting and dynamic. It's not just, boy sees pretty girl and falls in love.Ultimately, I loved the book and only kind of liked the film. It's not perfect in my mind and could use a little umph, but it'll be a great movie to work to. It has worked wonders on inspiring my appetite for Indian cuisine. Check it out, if you've got the time.
2 comments:
Wow Andrew...I loved that book too. I'm very intrigued about the movie version: I have such strong visuals in my mind from the book, I'm almost afraid to see it translated through somebody else's imagination. Thanks for the tip..
I'm always leery about the translations of others' imaginations. Not because their point of view isn't completely and totally valid, but because I have particular fondness for different things and see things wholly divergent than many do.
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