At the center of the film by Indian director Shekhar Kapur, the documentary that Zoe wants to shoot in Pakistan on the wedding according to the tradition of her neighbor and childhood friend Kazim
«Harry meet sally”
meet My big fat greek wedding. Or, as they say in the film, we are facing an update of «Love Actu
ally» in «Love Contractually»because the subject of this «What’s Love?» And the documentary that Zoe (Lily James) wants to do on the “assisted marriage” of the neighbor and childhood friend Kazim (Shazad Latif), a doctor born in London from a Pakistani family and determined to find a wife according to the tradition of his country, that is by making a contracted marriage by the family, who is in charge of introduce him to the woman which he considers right for him.
But since we are in London today, and above all we are in one commedia (scripted by Jemima Khan e directed by Shekhar Kapura sort of Spielberg of Bollywood) and what could be a theme not to be overlooked (the persistence of certain archaic traditions even among those who are well integrated in Western society) here becomes the starting point for one nice romantic diversion on the centrality of love in the relationship between the sexes (the original title «What’s Love Got to Do with It?», What does love have to do with this?, in fact he works for antiphrases). A love which both protagonists undertake to deny or minimize — Zoe going from disappointment to disappointment with her parents dating via Tinder and instead Kaz theorizing that love in a marriage comes later, thanks to custom -, love that will take 103 minutes of the 109 overall (end credits included) to triumph.
Because in the end there is and used (and very predictable) finale no one even wants to question it. Not what you expect from a movie like this. Rather the wait is on how it will come to that conclusion, through which digressions or twists, and from this point of view the film keeps its promises, crackling Of funny situations and of little ones pleasant curtains.
Not that the movie shy away from throwing on the table and problems that immigrants often suffer on their own skin. Although Kaz’s family and Zoe’s family live side by side, “there is a continent which divides the no. 47 from no. 49 »as the girl hears herself say after the umpteenth discussion, with reference to the civic numbers of the street where they live, and when he has to take the plane she knows she has to present herself in long advance because it risks being “randomly selected” for security checks or must feel guilty with everyone every time a Muslim carries out an attack. But these and other notations more or less «policies» they are immediately drowned in one balancing laugh.
The strength of the film is all in irony – perfectly bipartisan – with which the characters are described, starting with Zoe’s mother, Cath, a priceless Emma Thompson glass lover, ready to be adopted by the Pakistani neighbors but also determined to convince her daughter that the vet who takes care of her little dog (Oliver Chris) is her fideal boyfriend. Equal treatment for Kaz’s parents, the quintessential cliché, from his mother (Shabana Azmi) protective and intrusive to his sententious and mock-austere father (Jeff Mirza). Not to mention the fearsome grandmother wheelchair-bound (Pakiza Baig) sullen custodian of tradition or matchmaker Mo (Asim Chaudhry) and her efforts to find boyfriends and girlfriends for Pakistanis in Britain.
Is the story
? It proceeds as expected, with Zoe filming Kaz’s attempts to find a wife who convinces him and the family until the Skype choice of Maymouna (Sajal Ali), a calm Lahorean who wants to become civil rights lawyer and knows how to perfectly alternate the modest and shy version with the one that is unleashed when the parents don’t see. So between folklore and tourismbetween irony and smiles, the film moves towards the solution that everyone claims to want but that perhaps no one really wants and that Zoe’s documentary (to which two too clever producers will reserve a unexpected fate) will serve to question. Giving the cinema a role that no one expected.
March 12, 2023 (change March 12, 2023 | 21:03)
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