Such a Long Journey

by Gerald Peary

Once upon a time, the Persian conquerors reigned proud in India. But in 1971, the year of Such a Long Journey, the family of Persian descent at the center of this film find themselves squashed together in a lower-middle-class Bombay apartment overlooking a densely crowded sewage-reeking slum. The father, Gustad (Roshan Seth), dreams longingly of his patrician, privileged childhood. Now he's a lowly bank clerk who can't get even his family to respect him. His wife (Soni Razdan) shoves him around; his teenage son rebels against him, balking at dad's plan for him to become an engineer.

Suddenly, there's a chance of adventure for this Bombay Walter Mitty. An old friend demands a favor, a delivery of a package, and that package turns out to be full of money, part of a guerrilla plot to free Bangladesh from Pakistan. That's the set-up. Unfortunately, this plot goes nowhere much, and filmmaker Sturia Gunnarsson, a Canadian, treats even the boiling-over India-Pakistan war with Great White North politeness. There's nothing particularly wrong with Such a Long Journey, but it's not exactly incendiary, as it follows the Merchant Ivory way competently, numbly, by the numbers. At Natick.