Unlike the MPAA we do not assign
one
inscrutable rating based on age, but 3 objective ratings for SEX/NUDITY, VIOLENCE/GORE
and PROFANITY on a scale of 0 to 10, from lowest to highest,
depending on quantity and context.
Kal Penn stars as a young Indian man living in the United States with his parents and his sister. Although the parents hold onto their culture and heritage, the children rebel against it and begin to date people who are not of Indian descent. Also with Zuleikha Robinson, Irrfan Khan, Tabu and Jacinda Barrett. Directed by Mira Nair. [2:02]
SEX/NUDITY 5 - A husband and wife lie in bed together, they kiss, he caresses her and kisses her chest, and she moans and pushes his hand down her abdomen (it is implied that they have sex but no more is shown). ► A wife wearing a short robe dances for her husband (he's bare-chested) as he watches while lying in bed, and they kiss and snuggle. ► A young man and a young woman kiss, she takes off her clothes (we see her bare back and buttocks), they kiss and lie on a bed and it is implied that they have sex; we see the young woman smoking later, while they talk about her many lovers. ► A young man and a young woman lie in bed together and kiss (he is bare-chested). A young man and a young woman kiss. ► A woman wears a low-cut top that reveals cleavage in a few scenes, a woman wears a short top that reveals her bare abdomen, cleavage and bare back, and a man takes off his shirt in a Laundromat and puts it in a washing machine (we see his bare chest).
the review continues below...
VIOLENCE/GORE 3 - We see a dead man on a morgue table. ► We see a train crash where passengers are thrown around, we hear screaming, and we see flaming wreckage and bodies with large bloody wounds; we see one injured passenger lying in a puddle and then later in casts and bandages in a hospital. ► A woman grieves when she is told that her husband has died. A man's ashes are sprinkled into water during a funeral ceremony. ► A husband confronts his wife about her having an affair with another man. A husband and wife argue. ► We see a woman in a hospital going into labor (she moans and perspires). ► A wife consoles her husband after he wakes up from a nightmare about a train crash. There is a reference made to someone committing slow suicide by starving himself.
PROFANITY 3 - 1 obscene hand gesture, 3 scatological terms, 2 mild obscenities, name-calling (punk), 4 religious exclamations. [profanity glossary]
SUBSTANCE USE - Young men smoke marijuana. People drink alcohol at a party, a man drinks from a flask, and a young man and a young woman drink in a bar. A man smokes cigarettes in many scenes, and a man and a woman smoke cigarettes.
DISCUSSION TOPICS - Love, arranged marriages, cultural differences, immigration, India, Calcutta, fascism, homesickness, grief, death of a husband and father, acclimating to a new culture, infidelity, regrets, mourning, racism, leaving home, leaving family, the American Dream, adventure, the land of opportunity.
MESSAGE - Just because people come from the same culture does not always mean that they are meant for each other.
A CAVEAT: We've gone through several editorial changes since we
started covering films in 1992 and some of our early standards were
not as stringent as they are now. We therefore need to revisit many
older reviews, especially those written prior to 1998 or so; please
keep this in mind if you're consulting a review from that period.
While we plan to revisit and correct older reviews our resources are
limited and it is a slow, time-consuming process.
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