Kalki Koechlin is a name that is not likely to be familiar
to American audiences. She is a star in
her native India — in the world of Bollywood cinema — but she almost didn’t
land the pivotal role of Leni in director Anurag Kashyap’s 2009 film, Dev.D
(an adaptation of the Chatterjee novel “Devdas”), because she “wasn’t
Indian.”
Such is the conundrum of Kalki Koechlin, an international
beauty, born to French parents in India.
Raised in India, fluent in Tamil (plus English, French and Hindi),
educated, talented and a gifted actress ... a Bollywood star. Three-times nominated for IIFA Awards in the
Best Supporting Actress category — the equivalent of our Oscars.
On June 14, Wolfe will give domestic audiences a chance to
see her shine in director Shonali Bose’s international film sensation, Margarita
With a Straw. That’s the street
date for the award-winning DVD debut of a film that will make you a fan of Kalki
Koechlin, not because she is a Bollywood beauty, but because she is a gifted
actress.
In Margarita With a Straw she plays Laila,
a college student attending Delhi University, who is afflicted with cerebral
palsy. Wheelchair-bound, she is
nevertheless a talented writer with a flair for alternative music compositions,
who has her heart broken when she is rejected by a fellow student that she has
fallen in love with.
You see that it is hopeless — take one look at her — you
feel for her, her body contorted, but her brain alive; her beauty shines
through. So when an opportunity to
spend a semester abroad presents itself (at NYU) she jumps at it. Her mother, Shubhangini (Revathy — Thevar
Magan, Kizhakku Vasal), goes with her to Manhattan to help her
navigate this foreign culture; this alien world.
This is your set up.
Filmmaker Shonali Bose brings our poor, physically-challenged young
woman to a foreign land … where she might rightly find herself alone and
isolated. Instead, she meets another
student, a blind woman named Khanum (Sayani Gupta) from Bangladesh — in India
their paths would never cross.
At first her mother is upset, not that Khanum is from
Bangladesh (that is problem enough, but we are in Manhattan, so you deal with
it), or that she is blind (one blind, one in a wheelchair … how does that work),
but that she is a woman. Despite her
misgivings, she has never seen her daughter so happy.
For Margarita With a Straw to work — and
it is a beautiful film — you must accept Koechlin’s performance. She can’t be just an actor acting, rather
she must be the character of Laila. You
have to believe or the film simply doesn’t work. Of note, in interviews it has been revealed
that Shonali Bose’s sister suffers from cerebral palsy, so her understanding of
the affliction and what she expected from Koechlin has been translated to the
screen flawlessly.
Like we said, when Wolfe brings Margarita With a Straw to
the DVD market place on June 14 you will become a fan of Kalki Koechlin. She is an amazing talent.
The film is presented in Hindi and English (a mix), with
English subtitles throughout (Laila’s slurred dialogue is often hard to
understand). As a bonus, there is a
behind the scenes featurette.
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