Hope and a Little Sugar

Hope and a Little Sugar (drama)
Cast: Mahima Chaudhary, Anupam Kher, Amit Sial
Direction: Tanuja Chandra

A jelly bean of a film, this one looks at 9/ll - and the acrimonious aftermath - through sugar-coated glasses. Nevertheless, you are willing to forgive the childlike simplicity of the director's attempts to dissect complicated conundrums like racial prejudice, communal bias, only because it states its message so very simply. The pithy film celebrates the spirit of tolerance, humaneness and empathy without going into heavy-handed dissertations on terror, Islam, jehad, backlash....

The spirit of the film belongs to Anupam Kher who essays the role of a Sikh Colonel who heads a happy Hindustani family in Manhattan. Come 9/11 it isn't only the WTC Towers that end up as debris. The Colonel loses his son (Vikram Chatwal) in the terrorist attack and has no one to vent his anger on, other than Ali (Amit Sial), a young photographer who has befriended the family. Spending lonely hours in police stations and pubs, trying to find a rationale behind the gnawing sense of loss, he finds a soft target in the young Muslim and blames him for the violence that has scarred his life. Sense prevails when the turbaned Sikh himself becomes a victim of racial violence and it's time for building bridges once again; time for hope and a little sugar to sweeten up the soured affairs.

Watch out for a touching performance by Anupam Kher, an actor who still carries the sparks of Saaransh within.