Hypnotically Bad!! (Mega Rant!)
Oh forgive me, spices...
While every aesthetic instinct in my body screamed to change the channel, some masochistic force kept me transfixed to this deeply awful, awful "movie". I couldn't tear myself away as I had become fascinated by how truly terrible this film is-- never was the phrase "so bad it's good" so apt.
Aishwarya Rai has the acting ability of a lamppost, and seems to go through the entire film with the same, unfaltering 'stunned cat' expression-- reminder, if any were needed, that her entire brand, indeed her appeal, relies solely on her face. Had she been born with brown eyes like so many of us on this planet we'd never have heard of her.
The script is so bad it makes you want to laugh, then cry, then laugh, then cry again, like hearing a bad record on repeat. It's risibly written, with dialogue so awkward it sounds like it was written by someone with no knowledge of English at all. It's filled with enough clichés to open a shop. The characters are straight out of a Disney cartoon-- not a good Disney cartoon, one of the cheap bargain-basement ones you first come across at a yard sale-- and barely manage to drag their sorry carcasses through this epic non-story searching vainly for a corner to die in. So we have the mystic old Indian lady (of course), the unattainable flawless princess (Rai), the rogueish prince (of course he's not poor!), the old-fashioned and strict grandparents. Add to that a sprinkling of smiling, overly passive and non-threatening African-Americans and sexually-emasculated Indian men, and the retinue is complete!
Much of the film is narrated by Rai (is it even her voice??) as her character pleads with the spices to allow her love. Oh, the spices, the spices! Forgive me spices, thank you spices, I'm sorry spices, spices spices SPICES SPICES!!!
If I hear the word "spices" one more bloody time I'm going to bite a chicken's head off! The spices, the spices! Oh, the spices! Soon I am reduced to a whimpering wretch, pleading "please don't say "spices" anymore, I can't take it!"
The only, only even halfway-decent part is the brief scene when Padma Lakshmi's grandparents challenge her about her Mexican boyfriend. The grandfather, a laughably frank bigot (kind of like an Indian Alf Garnett) drives poor Padmi from the family with his racial intolerance, derived from India's medieval caste system, causing her to announce that she might as well marry the Mexican as the only thing holding her back was the family's approval. Sound good? It lasts about 32 seconds.
Other posters have pointed out the hilariously bad motorbike-across-the-bridge scene, which has the production values of a fifties B-movie. She's supposed to be on a motorbike for Chrissakes, can you not even put a wind machine, even a fan, just an ordinary run-of-the-mill desk fan, in front of her? Her hair and earrings are defying the laws of wind resistance! And the background isn't even moving in the right direction! What were you thinking sir, what were you thinking?!
A heavily Bollywood-ised Dylan McDermott plays the love interest, and proceeds to get more and more 'Indian' looking as the film goes on-- gee, trying to get the Bollywood audience, are you perchance? By the end of the film, I'm surprised he isn't driving a tuk-tuk. Of course, this completely negates any idea of challenging constrictive traditions and crossing cultures and makes the film damn near POINTLESS.
McDermott and Rai have NO chemistry. Repeat: NO chemistry WHATSOEVER. Their exchanges are so passionless you'd think he'd paid her for the hour. I've sat on bus seats with more romance than these two have together. There is zero romantic tension, as at no point does it seem that Rai, beautiful, flawless, untouched Rai, is in any way 'into' this guy-- she seems to surrender to his advances with the resigned air of a fading prom queen who has only the school nerd left to dance with. At no point does she seem comfortable with him, even at the end!
Oh, the spices! After nigh-on two hours of torturous non-story we get a hasty resolution in the last two minutes-- the old bat in India says it's okay now, the spices have forgiven you, and just like that everything's wrapped up in a neat little package! This would have been an anti-climax except, as just mentioned, there's no romantic tension and not enough of a storyline to disappoint. As it is, it's just a quick, humane way of putting this howler to sleep, like shooting a wounded horse in the head. Just hurry up and put it out of its misery!
So, in conclusion, I exhort you to use any means necessary to find this film and watch it. Like me you will be hypnotically transfixed, unable to tear yourself away, like the morbid curiosity you get when watching those car crash compilation shows. This film has found a spot dear to my heart, as its awfulness has fascinated me in a way I haven't experienced since Meg Ryan's "In the Cut". Mistress of Spices, I salute you!