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Mississippi Masala



The vibrant cultures of India, Uganda, and the American South come together in Mira Nair’s Mississippi Masala, a luminous look at the complexities of love in the modern melting pot. Years after her Indian family was forced to flee their home in Uganda by the dictatorship of Idi Amin, twentysomething Mina (Sarita Choudhury) spends her days cleaning rooms in an Indian-run motel in Mississippi. When she falls for the charming Black carpet cleaner Demetrius (Denzel Washington), their passionate romance challenges the prejudices of both of their families and exposes the rifts between the region’s Indian and African American communities. Tackling thorny issues of racism, colorism, culture clash, and displacement with bighearted humor and keen insight, Nair serves up a sweet, sexy, and deeply satisfying celebration of love’s power.

DIRECTOR-APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

• New 4K digital restoration, supervised by director Mira Nair and director of photography Ed Lachman, with 2.0 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray
• New audio commentary featuring Nair
• New conversation between actor Sarita Choudhury and film critic Devika Girish
• New interviews with Lachman, screenwriter Sooni Taraporevala, and production designer and photographer Mitch Epstein
• English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
  PLUS: An essay by critic Bilal Qureshi and, for the Blu-ray, excerpts from Nair’s production journal

Not sure if anyone else attended the Wexner Center events last night, but there was a showing of this film with an in-person discussion first from Russell Smith, of Criterion. Smith showed some examples of the restoration that was done on this, mostly to remove dirt, reduce flickering and correct softness and remove burned-in subtitles. The comparison scenes shown were hardly a revelation but were an improvement. Smith also mentioned repeatedly of the "teal-green" colors that they worked hard to get correct as Lachman was "obsessed" with that color. Interestingly he also said that Nair had purchased back all of the rights of the film herself but he had no explanation as to why Criterion had not yet acquired the streaming rights.

How was the film itself?

therewillbeblus wrote: Sun Feb 27, 2022 3:38 pm How was the film itself?

In terms of the restoration itself I am not sure as I honestly had never seen the film ever before last night so I had no frame of reference as to whether the restoration was worth all the fuss. Smith said that working with the original negative was easy enough except when they found a dupe that was in better condition in several places but had burned in sub-titles so they had to digitally restore both the negative and the dupe-print and then utilize pieces of each to fix some color issues and compensate for the burned-in subtitle issues. Smith's discussion about the film itself brought almost nothing new if you have read prior articles on the film, or on Nair or even just wikipedia, but if anyone in the audience had never heard of this film then they got some decent amount of info as to why Criterion put in the time on this.

In terms of the film itself, I would compare it, in some respects, to imagining a cross between a straight-My Favorite Laundrette and Sunshine Cleaning in its tone about relationships among the true working class in jobs that (almost) no one else wants, but in a non-violent Romeo and Juliet cultural feud. I will not be buying the film itself from Criterion as it just was not my cuppa tea, but I can see why some people will look forward to watching it again.

britcom68 wrote: Sun Feb 27, 2022 10:26 pm In terms of the film itself, I would compare it, in some respects, to imagining a cross between a straight-My Favorite Laundrette and Sunshine Cleaning in its tone about relationships among the true working class in jobs that (almost) no one else wants, but in a non-violent Romeo and Juliet cultural feud. I will not be buying the film itself from Criterion as it just was not my cuppa tea, but I can see why some people will look forward to watching it again.

Thanks! I appreciate the points of comparison in your writeup- I don't really like any of the works cited, including the Bard's... so a library rental it'll be

This was pretty unremarkable- for while it presents an interesting idea in blending the differentiated conflicts of cross-racial and cross-cultural dynamics into one amalgamation of personal and mass-contextual trauma, the central sociopolitical conceit is undermined by the cutesy romance and oversimplified contrived verbiage. Sure, it's cool to see Denzel give sharp retorts about skin color shades being labile social constructs, or witness arguments amongst diverse sects of people across socioeconomic and cultural demographics we aren't usually privy to specific histories on, but such moments almost always take complex realities and whittle them down to an Us v Them Romeo + Juliet melodrama, negating the depth of the film's core in the process (that is, aside from the strong bookends that effectively detail the trauma and isolation of being driven from one's home and the ensuing casualties-by-association that tragically result from that).

The biggest problem though is that the central romance never feels earned, and so the repetitive detours from the most interesting 'coulda-been' narrative magnetically diverting us back to Washington and Choudhury are all-for-naught. The two actors are more than capable, but they can't rise above the material, which strictly from a writing perspective doesn't 'develop' in any way that breathes or invests us. It's a romance born from inauthentic drives, doesn't even get an opportunity to go full-lust -which is usually the 'out' to fast-track laziness in detailing the evolution stages, and the 'problem''s effects demand an involving union with chemistry in order to highlight the need to bypass with unreserved motivation. I feel like there's a half hour missing somewhere that's supposed to make me care about the least interesting story point I'm already lamenting is the A-plot, but I don't know where it would go.. the movie is already two hours long!

Couldn't find a dedicated thread for Mira Nair, so I figure here would be an okay place to mention her son, Zohran Mamdani, is very likely to become the next Mayor of NYC. A lot of friends who are into both film and city politics have been surprised when I've dropped this little fun fact lately.

I'm also taking bets on whether he'll do a Criterion Closet video before the general election in November.

I had no idea. I had recently watched his debate and was impressed with his performance. Maybe she had some help with his adeptness at self-presentation/ public speaking?

That's a very interesting factoid! Especially when thinking that Mira Nair's contribution to that September 11 anthology film was about Islamaphobia on the streets of New York in the wake of that event.

For what it's worth, his father is one of the more accomplished and visible postcolonial scholars working today, so he too probably helped his son with message and messaging

I don't know that I would have sought this film out on my own, but it happened to be on The Criterion Channel livestream this evening. Denzel, Choudhury, and Roshan Seth are all excellent, though the movie suffers from a pervasive slackness. There's about 80 minutes worth of movie stretched out to 120. However, every minute of it is gorgeously shot by Ed Lachman. Whether it's natural light with a golden sunlit glow or nighttime exteriors with neon lights or softly lit interiors, it's beautiful. It gives the movie a timeless, contemporary look, and it doesn't feel 34 years old until the end credits start.

Saw it myself for the first time not long ago. Has that ineffable 90s "look at us, we're making a movie!" quality, just a few passes away from being really polished, but still? Kind of delightful, and as Matt says, the key performances are all sharp and it's luminously shot by Lachman. Konga Mbadu's performance as the father's childhood friend in Uganda was particularly moving.

HypnoHelioStaticStasis wrote: Wed Jun 25, 2025 11:41 am Couldn't find a dedicated thread for Mira Nair, so I figure here would be an okay place to mention her son, Zohran Mamdani, is very likely to become the next Mayor of NYC. A lot of friends who are into both film and city politics have been surprised when I've dropped this little fun fact lately.

You picked the right thread to drop this into, because the reason why Mamdani was born in Uganda in the first place is because his parents met when his soon-to-be-mother was doing field research for Mississippi Masala!

I went to a William Dalrymple lecture last night and after his entrance was applauded he insisted we gave another round of applause to Zohran Mamdani (who, needless to say, was not there).

Lowry_Sam wrote: Wed Jun 25, 2025 3:56 pm I had no idea. I had recently watched his debate and was impressed with his performance. Maybe she had some help with his adeptness at self-presentation/ public speaking?

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