Go to the Movies with Mira Nair

Check out these eight unforgettable films by the Oscar-nominated director who is also Zohran Mamdani’s mother.

Manvi Jalan in the Indypendent

Mira Nair’s movies examine the complex challenges, inequalities, dreams and desires we face in our lives. She often tackles uncomfortable realities and asks provocative questions with nuance, without judgement, and with a sense of humor. Her stories carry gravitas, yet are still entertaining. She has called New York, India and Uganda home, and the many places she has ties to show up in her movies.

Nair’s films are a reflection of the multitudes she carries within her. She first got involved with theatre at Delhi University in India, and then discovered documentaries at Harvard University. She talks about how the lives and stories of people on the streets inspired movies like Salaam Bombay! and Mississippi Masala. It was only later in her career that she drew inspiration from books.

Nair started a nonprofit school called Maisha in Kampala, Uganda. “The mantra of Maisha if we don’t tell our own stories, no one else will,” she said.

Regarding her son the mayor-elect, “Zohran has been marinated in love, not just from us, his parents, but from intergenerational family life,” Nair told Harper’s Bazaar in November. “He’s so secure in knowing who he is.” In other interviews, she has talked about how Zohran spent a lot of time in India, Uganda, and South Africa, as well as New York, and how he was exposed to the world, including his father’s work as an academic and his mother’s work. He knew how they thought and what they cared about.

When asked about how he will help New Yorkers find (romantic) love, Zohran quips that New Yorkers don’t have time for love cause they’re too busy surviving, but when they can afford the city and move out of survival, there’s room for falling in love.

At their core, Mira Nair’s stories are about seeking love, and peace, negotiating life and death. When we’re out of survival mode, we can love. Or maybe they’ll reveal how it is far more difficult to experience secure love when people are fighting for scraps.

My favorite Mira Nair movies, in no particular order:

Salaam Bombay! (1988)

Before there was Slumdog Millionaire, there was Salaam Bombay! An ode to Mumbai’s street children, the movie follows Krishna, a young boy who can’t return to his home till he makes 500 rupees to pay for setting his brother’s motorbike on fire. He ends up in Bombay (now Mumbai), selling tea in the underbelly of the city, near a brothel. There he makes friends, falls in love, and navigates survival.

Nair cast street children in the film, listening to their stories about gangs, sex, and running away. She embedded those stories in the plot, and put the children into acting workshops. “The combination of childhood and wisdom in their faces is very difficult to find in actors who don’t come from the streets,” she says. “I think they felt that for the first time others were interested in them as human beings.”

Nair established the Salaam Baalak Trust in 1989, using some of the film’s profits to support street children, including housing, education and vocational training. The cast received stipends for school after production. For some, it was a gateway out of life on the streets.

The writing, direction and acting are raw and feel authentic, and paint a vivid picture. Nair’s treatment of the characters is human, not sugarcoated or sympathetic, but it feels honest and dignified. The writing is both hilarious and heartbreaking.

Salaam Bombay! is in Hindi. It won the Caméra d’Or and the Prix du Publique at the Cannes Film Festival in 1988, and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Where to Watch: Kanopy

India Cabaret (1985)

Nair’s India Cabaret is an unflinchingly honest tale of Bombay’s cabaret dancers in the 1980s. We meet Rekha and Rosy, two dancers who ended up in the same “line.” They were the only two who agreed to be filmed dancing, and openly shared their stories. Rekha is fiery, confident and playful. Rosy’s family knows of her work and refuses to accept her. Nair interviews the club owner and the men who frequent the club and speak of how they want their wives to be “sati savitri, chaste,” but desire “the whore.” She also speaks with one regular’s wife, who is aware of his escapades.

Nair brilliantly juxtaposes the dancers’ dreams, prisons and desires with those of the housewife. The housewife yearns to dream, to be free, to explore the world on her own terms outside the tyranny of a man, while the cabaret dancers yearn for a man, a husband who will take care of them, a family that will nourish them, stability and protection instead of independence. The paradox of desire is that a new desire replaces an old one once we get what we want, and we get trapped into an eternal loop of discontent. The antidote? Gratitude. The antidote, contentment. The antidote, surrender and acceptance of what is, and the humility to learn the lessons this present moment demands.

The cabaret dancers are both shunned and desired, liberated in their sensuality and financially free, but outcast. The empathy, honesty and skill with which Nair interviews them, and shoots and pieces together this film is exquisite. If you watch only one movie on this list, watch this one.

Where to watch: Criterion Channel, Youtube

Monsoon Wedding (2001)

In this fun, vibrant family flick. Aditi Verma is to be married to Hemant Rai, a young “non-resident Indian” citizen who lives in Texas. Her sister Ria has a secret she’s been guarding, and so does Aditi. The wedding decorator has been working on weddings for decades, and wonders when it’ll be his turn. There are beautifully shot parallels between the wealthy families and the working class, and a lively portrayal of all the chaos that ensues when two families come together for a wedding, all the skeletons in the closet. In its specificity, the story becomes universal.

Monsoon Wedding was one of Nair’s biggest commercial successes. She worked with screenwriter Sabrina Dhawan, then a film student, who is also Punjabi. They wanted to make a film about loud, vibrant, spirited Punjabi families, and drew from their own cultures. They shot it in 30 days. The Laughing Club, a documentary Nair shot during the monsoon season “was directly the genesis, stylistically and emotionally, in every way, of Monsoon Wedding.”

Where to watch: Criterion Channel 

The Namesake (2006)

An adaptation of Jhumpa Lahiri’s novel The Namesake, this is the heartbreaking story of the Ganguli family, set between Kolkata and New York. Ashoke (a quietly brilliant Irffan Khan) comes back home to get married to Ashima (played with depth by Tabu) who leaves everything she knows to emigrate with her new husband. They name their son Gogol after an author Ashoke loves. The film follows the novel’s plot, a story of loss, grief, home and all the sacrifices of an immigrant family.

Have a box of tissues ready. This is one of the most melancholic movies in this list. It’s ultimately about family and the relationship between parents raising children who end up being different culturally because they’ve grown up in this foreign land, and then in grief learning to value what was taken for granted. Nair talks about how Kal Penn was cast as Gogol because 14-year-old Zohran egged her on to do it, which led to Penn auditioning for the role.

Where to watch: Hulu

Queen of Katwe (2016)

Based on the true story of Phiona Mutesi, a young girl from the slums of Kampala, Uganda, who was discovered to be a chess prodigy and rose to international prominence with the help of her coach, Robert Katende. Zohran Mamdani makes a cameo in this film, and his song “No. 1 Spice” is featured.

This is a wholesome Disney family movie. It’s a sweet story of how lives can change when people like Katende take a chance on children with nothing. It humbly reminds us not to look down on the intelligence of those who have less, and the very real risk and fear of dreaming is sometimes tasting luxury, or a better life, and then not having a way back to it and so resigning to not dreaming at all feels safer. In this case, though, Phiona finds her way out of the slums.

Where to watch: Disney+

Hysterical Blindness (2002)

A drama that tells the story of three women in pursuit of love, negotiating loss and men who seem to leave. Debbie (Uma Thurman) is a young, insecure and awkward 20-something, while her bestie, a single mother, just wants to have some fun. They reminisce about their high school days when boys would be circling them. Meanwhile, Debbie’s mother cautiously steps into a romance with a customer at the diner she works at.

Debbie’s story, desperately seeking love while attracting men who are emotionally unavailable, is paralleled with the secure relationship developing between her mother and her new boyfriend. It’s a nuanced story about all the perils of desire, of being wanted, of love and the loss that comes with it.

I love how subtle and complex the characters are, and the cinematography contains brilliant shots that powerfully parallel the women’s love stories.

Where to watch: Apple TV

The Perez Family (1995)

In The Perez Family, a comedy, Dorita Perez, a sugarcane worker, leaves Cuba for Miami. As single women are not favored by immigration authorities, she has to find a sponsor, so she needs a family. Luckily, Perez is a common last name, and she happens to be standing next to Juan Perez, who, when asked if he has a wife, says yes. The officer who greets them at the dock assumes the wife is Dorita. The movie is hilarious, with some brilliant writing, compelling actors, and a powerful reflection on the illusions of the “American Dream,” the immigration system and Cuban history.

I love this movie for its timeless relevance. The immigration system has always been bureaucratic and challenging. The American Dream’s mythic promise still draws people to the shores of the U.S. All dreams are illusions, all desires look rosy in our imagination and quite different in reality. To immigrate is to leave home where life is familiar, where the people you love are present, and where you know you belong legally, culturally, and in the hearts of those who love you. To come to a foreign land is challenging, unfamiliar, and reminds you that you do not belong—neither legally, culturally, nor in the hearts of strangers who do not know you—until you earn a place. To immigrate can also be rewarding, exciting, and a thrilling way to grow and meet a new chosen family. At home, we yearn for freedom outside, outside, we yearn for the comfort of home. The film may offer insight into a new perspective and does so with great humor.

Where to Watch: Tubi

Mississippi Masala (1991)

An interracial love story, set in Mississippi, of Ugandan-born Meena and African-American Demetrius, who fight for their life together. Meena’s family was exiled from Uganda during Idi Amin’s regime because the dictator believed Africa was for Black Africans. It was quite a revolutionary film when it was released in 1991, and it still is: a love story as a lens to examine racial prejudice, stereotypes and history. It’s funny, it’s poignant and has the right dash of masala (if you don’t know what masala means, you’ll learn when you watch the movie). Nair makes cameos as a gossiping aunty, a fantastic example of how she doesn’t take herself too seriously. (And while doing the research for this movie, Nair met Zohran’s father, Mahmood Mamdani.)

Where to watch: HBO Max