Customer Reviews

Parineeta

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I found the modern movie a little difficult to follow because I couldn't figure out all the relationships the characters had to each other. Apparently there are words in Hindi for relatives that we just don't have in English. Add to this the confusion of Shekar's mother calling Lalita her "daughter" affectionately. She doesn't act like a mother, during that separation period, but as I learned, that's because she's NOT really the girl's mother. The earlier black and white version of the film makes the relationships slightly more clear.

Both movies fall short of one of the main premises of the book, which is that Lalita is only 14 years old! The book was written when child marriage was both legal and common. Lalita being only 14 explains a lot about her feelings for her benefactor Shekar. He's a bit of a cad in the book, not above putting little Lalita through a lot of hell just to save face himself.

This was a popular romance at the time it was written. I can understand why. Like Cinderella, Lalita seems to over come overwhelming odds simply because she is good and kind. She has few resources. It is her moral strength that finally shames Shekar into doing right by her. A fantasy, sure, but a pleasant one.