The film is based on the real life story of a British- Indian woman
Kiranjit Ahluwalia. Kiranjit, who hails from Punjab and is treated by
her husband brutally and she silently bears all this for ten years.
Then suddenly one day she sets her husband on fire.For a topic so bleak and depressing the film provoked, starring aishwarya rai as kiranjit ahluwalia, proves to be quite gripping one
Part courtroom drama, part kitchen sink realism, it defies the popular indian sentiment of filmmaking, where melodrama is the key to making a point .Kiranjit’s life is high on drama, so director jagmohan mundra prefers to tell it like this
Navin andrews plays the tarnished, psychotically possessive husband deepak .It starts with a slap because kiranjit dances with his friend as he instructs her to.And finally after years of mental and physical abuse, infidelity, he threatens to burn her eyes out with an iron This proves to be her breaking point, and she sets fire to him when he’s asleep.
Naveen unfolds the husband’s increasingly abusive nature husband with alarming effectiveness
Aishwarya’s performance is passable.Superficially she does everything right, and at one point when she is first reunited with her sons in prison she does it fabulously well.
The best part of the film begins when she meets her jail mates.Fitting because the story goes that it is in the jail that she finally finds freedom
Miranda richardson( remember her as Rita skeeter from the harry potter film) does a good job as the tough cellmate who takes the mousy kiranjit under her wing.It is the most basic yet successful formula of entertainment, where there is a defeated person who finds camaraderie against a common bully And finally in the face of crisis the underdog comes through.
Finally with the help of radha(nandita das) and the organisation she works for -an asian feminist organisation called the south hall black sisters -Kiranjit challenges her conviction for murder The result is a landmark judgement that changes the face of british law in relation to domestic violence
The film moves at a precise, steady pace, so if you have no patience for details, this movie is not for you