But despite the temptation, it is eventually too docile an affair to send the heart pounding and the pulse racing.Įnglish Vinglish, for all its surface gloss and clean family entertainer aspirations, doesn’t possess that little something needed to turn a one-dimensional account of the makeover of an unassuming homemaker into a convincing, universal drama about a woman’s empowerment.
Tame superficiality is indeed the biggest bane of English Vinglish, which, for the most part, is otherwise reasonably watchable, especially owing to a charming performance by Sridevi, back on the big screen after a 15-year hiatus.Ī star is reborn and one wants to fall in love with her all over again. This film hinges on an idea that only reinforces the phony notion that a woman, no matter how gifted, must speak fluent English in order to truly assert herself. That, crucially, is also what debutante director Gauri Shinde’s well-meaning screenplay unwittingly heaps on the rather simplistically etched central character. That is precisely what Ms Shashi Godbole(Sridevi), Pune-based mother of two, is constantly subjected to by her corporate executive-husband, Satish(Adil Hussain), and her school-going daughter. She runs to her niece and asks: does it mean ‘mental’ judge? No, the girl tells her, it means jumping to damning conclusions about a person on the basis of flimsy evidence.
The protagonist of English Vinglish stumbles upon a word she has never heard before – judgmental.