Anusha Rizvi, who made ‘Peepli Live’, is back with her second feature, ‘The Great Shamsuddin Family’. It is a heartwarming comedy-drama set amid India’s present socio-political climate.
The story unfolds in Bani’s (played by Kritika Kamra) Delhi apartment, where she is racing against time to meet an important deadline. Her plans are disrupted when her cousin Iram (Shreya Dhanwanthary) arrives with an emergency, followed by her older sister Humaira (Juhi Babbar). Soon, one after another, her entire khandaan (family), mostly women, lands in Bani’s home. Each entry is hilarious and, if you watch closely, reveals a lot.
‘The Great Shamsuddin Family’ draws from real-life incidents and incorporates themes of intolerance and mob violence to examine the social-politics of today’s India through the lens of a Muslim family.
We have Bani, who believes she can find a better life in the US, a Zoheb and his Hindu girlfriend Pallavi, who want to fight the mob for their love, and Humaira, who is worried about her husband, who is perhaps caught in a communal clash. Then there are the aunties — Akko (Farida Jalal), Asiya (Dolly Ahluwalia), Safiya (Sheeba Chaddha), and Nabeela (Natasha Rastogi) — who turn up one by one and are a delight to watch.
Nearly every depiction of a Muslim family on Indian screens carries traces of prejudice, from stereotypes about how they look to assumptions about the community’s conservative nature. This is often mixed with political narratives around triple talaq, and the supposed need to ‘save’ Muslim women from their own community. The Shamsuddin family, however, looks like any other Indian family. Perhaps this is how people appear when they are not reduced to stereotypes on screen.
One of the striking metaphors in the film is Humayun’s Tomb, which stands as a silent witness to the atrocities faced by Muslims in the country, while contributing significantly to Delhi’s tourism!