By Jana Monji
Some of us are born into it and others are not. When the olders sister gets her ticket into Polite Society the relationship between two British Pakistani sisters is threatened. Yet this isn’t a coming-of-age or a wedding story; It’s an action comedy science fiction film that mostly succeeds.
Ria Khan (Priya Kansara) is a high school student with a girl posse (Seraphina Beh and Ella Bruccoleri). She dreams of becoming a stunt woman. Her older sister Lena (Ritu Arya) aspires to be an artist but also helps videotape her sister’s action shots for her YouTube channel. Unfortunately, both girls look like they are destined to disappoint their middle-class parents (Shobu Kapoor and Jeff Mirza). With Lena failing in school, she might end up as an office worker. Ria insists that Lena is “an artist, not a pencil-pounding desk shatter.”
Hoping to get a lifeline connection, Ria also writes to a famous UK stunt woman named Eunice Huthart (real person who was born and raised in Liverpool) who has worked on high-profile projects like Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker.
The family somehow wrangles an invitation to a posh party given by another British Pakistani family, members of the polite society that neither girl is ready to enter. Soon after, somehow Lena becomes the fiancée of the rich and successful doctor Salim (Akshay Khanna) whose mother hosted the party.
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Instead of being horrified by her awkward and underachieving potential daughter-in-law, Salim’s mother Raheela (Nimra Bucha) is oddly delighted. Raheela advises, “Behind every great man, there’s a very tired mother who’s sacrificed everything.” There’s also something oddly off between Salim and his mother, or at least, that’s what Ria thinks, but is Ria just being selfish?
Writer/director Nida Manzoor (We Are Lady Parts) fills this film with zany energy. Her science fiction twist, while a bit uneven in execution, is still fun and provides a promising platform for feminist comedy and science fiction. Manzoor even manages to include a dance number with gorgeous but relatively modest costuming.
Polite Society is a twisted tale about the Asian parental dream match of marrying a doctor. There will be a rude awakening as the feminists here are fighting for and with family. At the Palm Springs International Film Festival, Manzoor received a Directors to Watch Award for this film, and I agree.
Polite Society had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in January and was the closing film for the Glasgow Film Festival in March of this year. The film is scheduled to be released on 28 April 2023.
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