The Lunchbox (2014)

Now here’s a pure wake-up shot to my spoiled American self: A romantic comedy/drama from India that never sinks to Hollywood love clichés (love, sunset, no problems) and shows me lives and customs I never knew before. In Mumbai, there’s a whole industry of delivery men who collect lunch boxes from homes and bike the cargoes of food to the city’s vast web of office buildings, from wife’s kitchen to husband’s desk. We see that trade at the opening of “The Lunchbox,” which hinges on the joke that one woman’s (Nimrat Kaur) cooking efforts mistakenly land on the desk of a widower (Irrfan Khan) who longs for homemade food, for connection. Her actual husband? He’s too busy to notice her talent and likely philandering. Wife and widower bond through handwritten notes left in the food tins, each searching for emotion, and what better instigator than food? Writer/director Ritesh Batra never pushes expected romantic tropes, and layers her film with a stark realism of a city tripping over itself to quickly grow capitalist, but where being orphaned as a child carries social stigma into adulthood. The ending is perfection. A-

Memento (2001) and Ghanjini (2008)

"Memento" is the ultimate puzzle box film, a dive into a mind where the narrator is not only untrustworthy, but he may be completely mentally unstable. Nine years out, it is still Christopher Nolan's masterpiece, far and above "Insomnia" or "The Dark Knight" and "Batman Begins."

Guy Pearce ("L.A. Confidential") stars as Leonard Shelby, a former insurance investigator who was attacked in his home some years ago and as a result of a head injury, cannot form new memories. His whole life relies on Polaroid photos, scribbled notes, the testament of others, and tattoos that cover his body. Leonard is out to find the killers of his wife, murdered in that same attack. Or so we are told.

Nolan and his brother Jonathan, who wrote the film, tell their story backward - with an alternating forward motion in black and white -- so that we are as off balance as Leonard. Every next scene is the actual previous scene. Mark Boone Junior, Carrie-Anne Moss and Joe Pantoliano play the regulars in his life, all not to be trusted.

The beauty of this film, besides Pearce's mesmerizing, should-of-have-been-a-star performance, is how Nolan toys with the viewer's mind. And our morality. Does memory make a person, or does a person make their memories? How reliant are those memories? A brilliant twisting film that demands multiple viewings, "Memento" may be my favorite film of the decade. It can be watched a 100 times and remain fresh. A+

How's this for a mind-melting film? "Memento" was remade as an India Bollywood musical laced with noir, revenge film, mystery, slapstick comedy, romantic comedy, music, martial arts epic, college-romp girl mystery, rags-to-riches journey and western showdown. The result: "Ghanjini" -- written and directed by A.R. Murugadoss, with Aamir Khan as Sanjay Singhania, a rich CEO in the place of Guy Pearce's investigator.

Asin is the dead lover for whom Sanjay seeks vengeance. The backbone of the film is the same: A man, attacked by goons, cannot form memories, but nonetheless seeks revenge for his murdered beloved. But this film throws in every genre and is, by God, the most kinetic, insane, over-the-top, go-for-broke film I've seen in ages.

It isn't great, though: It's way overlong at three hours and has cheesy music that would make Menudo blush. But the absolute love, joy, thrills and action -- the heart -- of this film is undeniable. Khan is amazing as the romantic, determined business man and bumbling hero/singer turned muscle-bound mad man with whoop butt skills that would turn Ahnuld, Bruce and Sly all melt into jelly.

I can't help but like it, flaws and all. If only half the American films had this much energy. For sheer nutty joy. B+

Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

Not too go all superlative, but "Slumdog Millionaire" is the most exhilarating, electric, shocking, dazzling, vibrantly alive, and romantic film of 2008. (Notice the absence of "uplifting".) Its energy jumps with dazzling visuals, a pulsating sound mix, charisma-loaded actors, and the best film score of any Hollywood feature in years. To think this gem nearly went straight to DVD and suffered through studio hand-offs over xenophobic fears of marketing and profit. (Yet, Warner spent a $100 million on "Rush Hour 3"? A 20th Century Fox subsidiary released this. Good for them.) In 2008, as the economy and nation, the world seems to be derailing, derailed, this is the film we need, now more than ever, in 2007 or maybe next.

Straight off, the film is an ironic, reality-free fable in vein with a Dickens novel or any of the countless fantasy stories of a desperate child who grows up to make good, but new and exciting. It opens with a 20-ish man Jamal (Dev Patel) successfully blazing his way through India's version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire," the game show where participants answer A, B,C, D questions for huge money. Jamal is a child of Mumbai's harshest slums. Being a "slumdog" (basically an offensive term for India's poor), he can't be intelligent and push his way to win the game. Or so he's told. As are we. Tossed in jail as a cheat, Dev takes his policemen captors through his life story and why he knew each answer. The scene rockets -- this film moves fast -- to Jamal in his early school years.

His best friend/worst enemy is his brother Said (Madhur Mittal as an adult). The young boys' lives are harsh and the film pulls no punches in its portrayal of staggering poverty, or savage and graphic child abuse, including sexual. Orphaned after their Muslim mother is killed in a religious-sparked attack, the boys steal, improvise, and con to eat and stay alive. As they grow older Jamal manages to keep his soul; to borrow a phrase from "Lost," he has a constant -- the beautiful Latika (Freida Pinto in adulthood), a fellow orphan -- to keep him grounded. But Said has no focus, and becomes hooked on violence and inflicting pain.

Back and forth the film goes, from the game show to the jail to the past for a dizzying ride. I can't say the film is realistic in the least, Jamal's luck on the show seems to be directed by God, and the script (by Simon Beaufoy) is more than happy to play that card with a wink and a nudge. And, there definitely is a devil in the detail, the game show's host (Irfan Kahn, an Indian star who could make mincemeat of Alan Rickman in a Sleaze Contest), himself a survivor of the slums who will not allow anyone to mimic his success.

Here, director Danny Boyle surpasses even the pulverizing world he painted in "Trainspotting." Every color pops with neon life, and the camera doesn't just capture the action, it is the action. A long scene at the Taj Mahal makes you feel as if you're a visitor, and when the orphans race through the mazelike slum alleyways fleeing policemen, the camera is right on their heels. This tale of children is not for children, it is full of death and moments so harsh you'll gasp in horror, but "Slumdog" has more life, joy, and hope than any film released this year. The spark, the fight, the energy on screen, in the lives of these characters, we need it now, across the globe. Cherry on the cake: The closing credits has the cast singing and dancing on a train platform to a spectacular Bollywood musical number. So damn good. My favorite film of 2008. A

Chaturanga (2008)

I saw the fine 2008 Indian film "Chaturanga" at a local university screening, part of a U.S. tour by the film's writer and director, Suman Mukhopdhyay. As with "I'm Not There," it's a film I enjoyed even though I didn't get all of the film's references because of my ignorance of India. But, this is a universal film about one man's struggle to comprehend the most mysterious forces in the world that enrapture, sooth, confound, tickle, plaque, haunt, bewilder and otherwise thrill the male mind: women, religion and logic.

The film is told in four chapters (the meaning of the film's title), as the college age Sachish (Subrata Dutta) leaves religion behind for a fully logical life, then leaves logic behind for a fully religious life, and then takes two more inner-journeys which I won't disclose as it would ruin the film. Sachish's logical journey is marked by twin tragedies, and he flees into exile for a year until his best friend Sribilash (Joy Sengupta) seeks him out in a religious commune. Also in the commune is a young widow (the sublime Rituparna Sengupta) who loves Sachish, who won't budge from his religious trek to return the feeling. The final chapter, told in a time line similar to "The Sweet Hereafter," reveals where the three leads stand some time later.

The universality of "Chaturanga" is its strength. India is shown as a country in conflict with itself politically, sexually, culturally and religiously. Mukhopdhyay has made a beautiful film about how his countrymen and women walk through that conflict. Few American films dig that deeply into cultural and personal fabrics.

The venue I watched the film in was not ideal: The projection appeared to be off a lousy DVD with the blown-out whites and murky darks, while the subtitles appear to be hit and miss. The action onscreen is apparent, so not ever word needs to be understood. Still, the drawbacks did mar my overall enjoyment of the film. Fair to the director? Maybe. Maybe not. I hope to see this again. B+