Filmmaker Geeta Malik Used Life Experiences for ‘India Sweets and Spices’
01.03.2022 - 04:17
/ variety.com
Shalini Dore Features News EditorWriter-director Geeta Malik’s “India Sweets and Spices” is set in the milieu of the Indian community in a New Jersey suburb, where the wealthy families with their weekend parties look down on the working-class fellow South Asians. The pic opened at Tribeca last year and played in theaters and will be on Hulu after March 8. This interview was edited for clarity and space.Where did you get the idea for this film from? Did you go to these kinds of parties?I went to these kinds of parties very often as a child.
I grew up in Aurora, Colo., and the community there at the time was smallish, it wasn’t a huge community. We’d go to our friends’ and our neighbors’ dinner parties. It was just a way to keep up with the community and eat our own food and just relax and enjoy the company of people that you shared a culture with.
As I got older, I was expected to interact more with the adults. And it was around that time where I started hearing what people were saying behind their backs but then smiling when they’d bring the chai. I thought it was a really interesting dynamic in our community.
I think it’s one that is very relatable, that’s what I’ve been hearing from people. If you live in a small town or a different kind of minority community, this happens because you want to stick with your people, you want that comfort and that warmth of community, but there’s a lot backbiting that can also happen. I thought that was a really rich environment for storytelling.
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