In what was easily the most anticipated film we’ve ever shown, Raisa – after over two years – was able to finally bring us the film she was lined up to present when the pandemic started. That film, which would have been the first Indian film presented at movie night if it were shown on schedule, was Ritesh Batra‘s 2013 epistolary film The Lunchbox, and it’s a pretty lovely little film.
Now Ila’s been in love before/And she knows what love is for/It should mean a little, a little more/Than a stainless can
Living in Mumbai, Ila is a housewife whose marriage has become stale and is trying to spice things back up. Her husband uses the city’s famous dabbawala service, a famously efficient system which delivers lunches from homes and/or restaurants to office workers. In an attempt to get her husband to notice her efforts, she takes the advice of her yenta upstairs neighbor and tries making a special lunch for her husband. In what seems like a rousing hit, the lunchbox comes back nearly licked clean (a rarity at best) – but her husband makes no mention of the food when he comes home.
Just a CPA, I’m lost in Mumbai-oh/Another lunch today, the box has a new style-oh
The problem, it turns out, is that there was a mixup in the dabbawala service, and Ila’s lunch was delivered instead to a somewhat confused accountant, Saajan. Saajan is near retirement, and has been quite socially distant in his dealings with any and all since the death of his wife, including continued dismissals of his intended replacement Shaikh. But even this grumpypants knows a good lunch when he gets one – so much so that he makes a special trip to his normal restaurant to praise the meal he thought was theirs (with the unintended consequence that they think he really loved their cauliflower).
It’s naan-stop food porn!
Well, soon enough Ila’s resentment over her husband’s apparent refusal to acknowledge the food she thinks he is enjoying leads to her neighbor suggesting that she “spike” the meal with too much chili pepper. She includes a sarcastic note, saying that she hopes he likes it. This particular spicy meal with the note prompts Saajan to respond to the heat negatively.
It said “Gimme, gimme a call sometime”/But she knows what that’ll get her
Between the response, and her husband’s comment about how much cauliflower he has been getting for lunch lately, Ila comes to realize that the lunchbox is going to somebody other than its intended recipient, but instead of trying to fix things, she starts up an epistolary relationship with Saajan.
Scrub this out with S.O.S/Scrub this out with S.O.S./Scrub this out with S.O.S/Scrub this out with S.O.S.
We watch the two of them develop a secretive friendship through letters exchanged in the lunchbox, and for the majority of the film it’s a lovely little platonic thing.
Shaikh’s on a train
But while Saajan’s life begins looking up – he treats everybody better, including a budding friendship with his replacement Shaikh – Ila’s life goes downhill. See, her husband has been having an affair (the reason for the emotional distance, we must assume) and he leaves Ila and their school-age daughter.
This is the point where Saajan and Ila’s relationship threatens to develop into a romance, despite the fact that he’s probably 25 years older than she is. After Ila’s suggestion that she might move to Bhutan, Saajan suggests that he might join her, rather than retire to his intended Nashik. They agree to meet in-person at a restaurant, but as Saajan gets himself gussied up for the date, he realizes that he smells like his grandfather used to smell, and he comes to the conclusion that he is far too old for Ila. So he stands her up. Ila is upset, but Saajan insists that she move on and follows through on his retirement to Nashik. Once Ila learns of this, she finalizes her plans to leave for Bhutan while a reconsidering Saajan is trying to make his way to her Mumbai home. And the film leaves us there in media res. The End.
The Lunchbox is quite a lovely little film, and I was a bit confused by seeing a “Bollywood” label on it, since it isn’t the classic mix of melodrama and musical that I associate with the term. But apparently “Bollywood” applies to any film made in India, and the genre that I am thinking of is actually known as “masala”, so there you go. The film itself is not only believable but it’s sweet without being cloying – at least as long as the relationship between our main characters remains platonic. For perhaps the first half of the film I worried about the impending romance between these poorly age-matched characters (I mean, I guess that’s not fatal, but it’s not so believable) before finally disabusing myself of that concern. Yep, only to have that rug pulled out from under me! The deliberately ambiguous ending acts as a nice touch that likely placates both thos ewho hoped the film would have a romance and those who hoped it would not – as both sides can write their own result. I’m going to write it with Ila and Saajan passing each other unawares, never to meet again, but hey, I’m kind of a jerk.
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