Heaven on Earth
Heaven on Earth
| 06 September 2008 (USA)
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When Chand arrives in Brampton, Ontario to meet her new husband, she leaves behind a loving family and supportive community. Now, in a new country, she finds herself living in a modest suburban home with seven other people and two part-time tenants. Inside the home, she is at the mercy of her husband's temper, and her mother-in-law's controlling behaviour.

Reviews
mehrin-shahed

I have borrowed all lines from other reviews to make a summary of my own: A vibrant and lovely girl, Preity Zinta as Chand flies to Canada to marry a man she has never met. Ironically enough, Chand's new family in the First World lives a poor, miserable lifestyle. Soon Chand becomes a brutally battered and abused wife who bears the brunt of her husband, Rocky's frustration. An intelligent audience doesn't need to see all out, emotional, crying scene to justify actions. A man sitting in a car, lost in though, is more than enough. Rocky isn't shown as a monster, he is shown as a very flawed man who doesn't understand how to deal with his problems, taking his anger out on those weaker than him.Chand is who she is. A girl in a new land. A girl with expectations. Trapped within a system of willing accomplices. She suffers, she aches, she misses her mother, her country, she is desperate thinking that she will have to live the rest of her life with a bunch of monsters, yet she never really loses her sense of life. She does not blame anyone, she does not hate anyone, she seeks solace using her imagination. She creates a world that is better, and lives it. She creates a "Heaven on Earth".It may be slow paced but it’s still engaging and compact. This is a film that confronts so many issues in a very muted and delicate manner. No, I am not talking about domestic abuse. This is an explosive issue, and is dealt with as such. There are issues of expectations…of survival…of denial, of how young ones react - the subtle explorations of the human mind and nature - these are the ones to watch out for.We, as the viewers of this small snapshot in a girl's life, are forced to consider the definitions of mental health. Who is insane? The one that hallucinates? The one that is violent? The one that manipulates? The one that witnesses? All silently-screaming puppets on a string being maneuvered into a life of domesticated dereliction by forces that we could designate as fate or just cruel blows of workaday drudgery…Deepa Mehta stays away from the stereotypical 'Don't-hit-me' pitiable victim and also 'I'll-hit-you-back' kind of liberating experience approach. Mehta doesn't play out any moments of redemption or payback. She simply offers us survival, intelligently integrating magical realism in a rather artistic way. Every time Chand is maltreated by her husband, she starts whispering beautiful, beautiful poetry. When she's alone, she imagines a better life, she imagines she is a beloved woman and wife. All the sequences involving the snake may be confusing and unclear, but what I find great about these essentially surreal incidents is that every viewer is free to interpret them just the way he/she wants to.

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raman_arora

This is one of the worst movie I have ever seen.The starting 10mins is the only good part of the movie showing traditional Punjabi music / songs. After that it becomes slow... slower and slowest... and never picks up the pace.... This was 106 minute movie... and feels like 306 minutes there are pin drop silent moments which could have been done better by adding background score... There were many scenes which makes no sense or could have been easily edited .... so that was also not upto the mark...Preity Zinta did good acting... her good work was literally wasted in this worthless movie....I would not recommend this movie to anyone... *** CONTAINS SPOILER *** No one expects adding factitious stuff like KING COBRA in the film.. this is really good topic and could have been done / presented in much better way... I had very high expectations from a reputed director like Deepa Mehta...Also the place where the kid throws the dentures of his grandpa into drain should be after he is told that his bed will be taken by his uncle... so cinematography is not up to the par either...

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aniketc-iitkgp

Excruciatingly slow is the best way to describe this movie...I had trouble keeping my eyes open in the end..A Deepa Mehta movie is generally a good viewing...but this one disappointed me..The idea of the SheshNag was something I found hard to digest...Moreover the mythological story was told in a disjointed manner which made it pretty hard to follow...The performances are good...especially by Vansh who has the intensity required to portray the character of 'Rocky'..and Preity Zinta does give the right expressions..but seems too old to be playing a newly married girl..5/10

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Pratik Jasani

This definitely makes one wonder as to what a woman has to go through and in particular if she has to move from one country to another and live with people that she, at first, doesn't really know, she has to adjust as well as adopt to the way they live. A woman, who is married, leaves northern India, to live with her husband who she is meeting for the first time as well as her in laws, is a very good example of this setting, which captivates one from the beginning till the end.Directed and written by Deepa Mehta, and known as "Videsh – Heaven on Earth," in other parts of the world, the movie stars, Preity Zinta, Balinder Johal, Rajinder Singh Cheema and Vansh Bhardwaj.The theme of this also deals with domestic violence, which, in many parts of the world, is on the increase and how it really affects children and this is shown in its true colours in this film. Preity Zinta, what can be said about her performance? Absolutely spot on as is the performance by Vansh Bhardwaj. But what really captures the mood of this movie is the photographic technique used by the director – semiotics, where some scenery is filmed in black and white to make it a bit conspicuous from the others and in particular one of the Niagara Falls. There are certain aspects of the movie, which also make it a bit light and will probably make one laugh.With films such as "Water," "Bollywood / Hollywood," "Earth" and "Fire," Director Deepa Mehta has gone on to add this one on a list of films that can be said, is worth watching.

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