It should be utterly moronic and ignorant of me that I wilfully proclaim myself as a film admirer and it wasn’t until a few days back, that I watched Ritesh Batra’s The Lunchbox.
As beautiful as this film is, in this review I wouldn’t tell you what you already know, assuming many of you might already have seen it. Instead I will try and lay out some peculiar nuances from the film that happened to leave an irreplaceable mark on my mind.
Before I begin, here’s the plot of the film. Set in Mumbai, The Lunchbox shows Ila (Nimrat Kaur), a housewife cooks food for her husband and tries to reach it to his office through the dabba service, but instead it reaches Mr Sajjan Fernandez (Irrfan Khan), an employee of some other office, and this is how a communication, a friendship begins between the two, solely through the love for cooking and sharing thoughts and ordeals (if any).
Now coming back to what I initially proposed, there are some very unique elements I came across with this film. Symbolism sure is used, with Ila still listening to the radio for cooking recipes even in the modern times, indicating how old school she is. To be true, everything about Ila’s personality reeks of immense maturity and stability of the mind, something she might not fully acquire, but surely reminds herself to not forget. Her expectations from life are as basic as having someone to talk to, and having someone appreciate her love for cooking and seeing her not even get that so easily sends out a strong message of how low can life stoop to.
The high point of the film, is everytime Ila has a conversation with the invisible but so relevant and warm, Mrs. Deshpande. Her voice and the tokri she drops down are the only two indications of her presence, all throughout the film! I have never come across a film as successful in making a character like this sustain so beautifully.
Beyond everything else, The Lunchbox is about the little things Ila and Saajan share, even before they share their names to each other, and having witnessed this cinema makes me so full and pumped up in my heart.
The F Word 