Starring Sridevi, Gauri Shinde's 2012 film ‘English Vinglish’ was a delightful and heart warming story. When it premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, it received a 5-minute standing ovation. It was also India's official entry to the Oscars in the Best Foreign Language Film Category.
The story follows a housewife named Shashi, who loves her family, makes amazing laddoos and is constantly mocked by those around her, for her lack of English speaking abilities.
‘English Vinglish’ was a breath of fresh air when it came out, starring a veteran actress in a role that did not rely wholly on her husband or her children to define herself. Shashi was a character of great strength and substance. While her culinary skills were unbeatable and her personality sweeter than her laddoos, she was constantly made to feel lesser than.
Shashi who is often subdued and sad at the many digs her daughter and husband take at her for her bad English still loves them and everyone in her family immensely, not entirely expressing the sorrow that pierces her heart when the recurring disrespect begins to become her identity.Her husband goes on to make the comment, “My wife was born to make laddoos!” during a gathering at their house.
The scene reflects, perhaps, the universal experience of many women who are tied down to domestic duties and thus do not find the opportunities or the time to equip themselves with skills or education. This further gets twisted against these women when their sacrifices and their duties are overlooked and they are treated as comic relief. Shashi was not ashamed of her ability to make good food, in fact when she first hears and understands the word ‘Entrepreneur’ she is beyond herself with pride.
When Shashi goes to New York for her niece's wedding. She truly breaks free. Not only does she travel all by herself to another nation, she also learns to navigate a whole new city, make good friends, find a little bit of love and even enroll herself in English speaking classes.
What makes Shashi such a lovable and noble character is not her simplicity, or her beautiful sarees and endearing dialogues, it is not even her laddoos. What makes her stand out is that she does everything out of love and not once out of spite, despite being at the receiving end of so much flak from her family. She learns a language not because she wants to spite them but because she wants to make them proud.
Shashi also tries to understand the new dynamic she has with the intense French cook who attends the same English lessons as her, Laurent. He seems to admire her. They bond over a common love for food and not being fluent English speakers. What Shashi receives from Laurent is respect and tenderness. He respects her work as someone who cooks, he admires her and he enjoys her company without once making her feel small.
The movie culminates in Shashi having many epiphanies. One of which is that Laurent has made her realize she is worth something and deserves respect and kindness. It also makes her realize that she is a family woman and must demand what she deserves for herself from her husband. She also realizes she needs a firmer hand with her children.
Her speech at her niece's wedding is beautifully written and realistic. It is cluttered with minor mistakes here and there as one would expect from someone who has just begun to learn a new language from scratch. Her speech is powerful, it conveys her desires, her dreams, all that she observes but never shows. Her speech talks about marriage, about partnership and even about enduring a life together.
Her true spirit reflects in the fact that not once does she use the speech in a derogatory manner to shame anyone, instead she uses it to bless a young couple. In the process her guilt ridden family are finally able to see that Shashi too is a person worthy of love and respect.
When she places an extra laddoo in front of her husband to tell him she still loves him, it reflects her forgiving nature and her reclamation of the laddood, something that her husband used to mock her, as the very tool that reaffirms her worth and her love for her husband.
With beautiful cinematography, impactful dialogues and heartwarming music by Amit Trivedi, Gauri Shinde's ‘English Vinglish’ is a movie that is worth watching and learning from.
-Ananya Nair
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