A young Bangladeshi woman, Nazneen, arrives in 1980s London, leaving behind her beloved sister and home, for an arranged marriage and a new life.
She is trapped within the four walls of her flat in East London, and in a loveless marriage with the middle aged Chanu, she fears her soul is quietly dying. Her sister Hasina, meanwhile, through letters to Nazneen, tells of her carefree life back in Bangladesh, stumbling from one adventure to the next. Nazneen struggles to accept her lifestyle, and keeps her head down in spite of life’s blows, but she soon discovers that life cannot be avoided – and is forced to confront it the day that the hotheaded young Karim comes knocking at her door.
Director: Sarah Gavron
Writers: Monica Ali (novel), Laura Jones
Stars: Tannishtha Chatterjee, Satish Kaushik, Christopher Simpson
| Original title | Brick Lane |
| Production country | UK | India |
| Language | English | Bengali |
| Subtitle |    |
| Recommended age | 15 |
| Runtime | 102 min |
| Color | Color |
| Aspect Ratio | 2.35 : 1 |
| IMDb link | tt0940585 |
Nominated: Carl Foreman Award for the Most Promising Newcomer
Nominated: British Independent Film Award
Won: Best Screenplay
Won: Silver Hitchcock
Nominated: Evening Standard British Film Award
Nominated: ALFS Award
Won: C.I.C.A.E. Award
Beautifully acted and written so its themes are touched upon glancingly rather than with full force.
Monica Ali’s elegant and critically trumpeted debut novel, Brick Lane, about the travails, conflicting emotions and quiet liberation of a Muslim woman in London, is a far lesser thing in its bigscreen transformation.
Absorbing enough, moving enough, and visually attractive enough to provide a perfectly acceptable night out at the movies.
Certainly touching, even heart-rending at times, and it mostly steers clear of the didacticism and sentimentality its subject matter often invites. But it never takes the full measure of its modest heroine, and makes her world a bit too small.