Three brothers meet up a year after the demise of their father to make a journey that starts aboard a train named The Darjeeling Limited. The movie starts off looking like it’s going to be a spiritual journey – but it’s something else. It’s not about emotions running high. Not about the typical epiphanies shown where brothers realize at the end of the movie that they are meant to be with each other.
This movie is of humor and wit. Of brotherhood and friendship. Of life, love and responsibilities. Made with style, fantastic cinematography and finesse. How seemingly meaningless events in ones life changes perspectives or strengthens them.

And a whole lot of India.

The use of humor is both a mix of fortunate accidents and witty lines. The movie is splashed with a lot of Hindi, so much that it feels like Wes Anderson targeted an Indian audience for this movie. My favorite scene in the movie is when the train they are going in stops for a long time in the middle of nowhere.

Francis: What’s going on?
Brendan: I don’t know, I guess the train’s lost.
Jack: What did he say?
Peter: He said the train is lost
Jack: How can a train be lost? It’s on rails.

The movie scenes are witty, and camera sequences are brilliant in terms of creativity and execution. While most of my friends said that there was no plot really and see that as a bad point in the film – I differ slightly on that aspect. While I agree that the film is slightly episodic in nature, with no moral to take home, the direction and treatment of various aspects of strained human emotions are tastefully done. On a sublime level, it deals with life, living life and death as well in a way that makes you be a part of the movie in the very same steps as the characters.

Natalie Portman, Bill Murray, Irrfan Khan and several others make cameo appearances. Bill Murray does not even talk in the movie! Some rural concepts and behavioral patterns in India have been beautifully portrayed. But what was not clear from the movie was which era of post-independence it was set in. While the iPod was shown to exist, India seemed to be in the 60s-70s in terms of technological and railways development. Though on a bus used in the movie, the symbol of “50 years of Independence” was painted (could have been a goof). The movie is shown to be shot in Jodhpur and nearby places, apart from Darjeeling. Several pristine locations in India have been used for shooting several scenes – the temples, the deserts and the tiny cities. The trains (The Darjeeling Limited, The Bengal Lancer) give the impression of today’s Palace on Wheels. Used primarily by tourists and foreigners, the “stewards and stewardesses” applied kukkum to the passengers and offered lemon juice to them when they boarded. Like I said, great attention has been paid to the tiniest of details. There was a mix of local Indians who knew English and who didn’t. The plot also accounted for emotions being lost between the characters because of the language barrier. A lot of the Hindi splashed in had humor, which were not shown in subtitles – which is OK for the Indian public – but the Americans would have benefited from subtitles. There were several occasions when the Indians in the cinema hall burst out laughing because the humor was in the local dialect, but the Americans didn’t quite get it .

The soundtrack is excellent, with music borrowed from some of Satyajit Ray’s movies (eg. Apur Sansar and Charulata) and several classical Indian composers. Among the other songs borrowed, The Kinks’ (Strangers and This Time Tomorrow [in trailer]) and Peter Sarstedt’s (Where do you go to my lovely) songs were the best.

On a whole, a wonderful treat from Wes Anderson, makes you think of his earlier movie – The Royal Tenenbaums.

The Darjeeling Limited: A must watch for appreciators of good cinema.
Rating: 9.5/10