Brick Lane 2007

Jan Stuart, Chicago Tribune: [A] glossy but overly efficient drama that, like Nazneen's husband, is ultimately too ineffectual to make much of a dent. Read more

Sara Cardace, New York Magazine/Vulture: Monica Ali's expansive, epic best seller about decades in the life of a sheltered wife from Bangladesh in the titular London neighborhood is transformed into a compact, delicate tale of adultery, extremism, and awakening. Read more

Andrea Gronvall, Chicago Reader: Its flat, static quality belies the novel's richness. Read more

Tasha Robinson, AV Club: Brick Lane feels slight and late to the table. Still, its pretty musings about small-scale self-actualization can be seductive. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: For most of the movie, we feel as trapped as she does, and the lurching narrative seems anything but novelistic. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Small, intimate and achingly modern, Brick Lane is a lovely study involving both one woman's awakening and the inevitability of cross-cultural pollination. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: Adapted from the 2003 Monica Ali novel, Brick Lane is one of those feminist cries in the dark in which the heroine, a saintly sufferer, is more admirable than interesting. Read more

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail: [The film] hits all the cliches of romantic literary adaptation: montage, letters read aloud in voice-over, a swelling musical score. Read more

Ella Taylor, L.A. Weekly: Sarah Gavron's tale of a young Bangladeshi woman unwillingly transplanted to London's East End is absorbing enough, moving enough and visually attractive enough to provide a perfectly acceptable night out at the movies. Read more

Connie Ogle, Miami Herald: As Nazneen, Tannishtha Chatterjee proves to be the quiet force that drives the film, ably projecting a depth of emotion with few words. Read more

John Anderson, Newsday: Where it's going all seems predetermined, but the visual journey is lovely, Robbie Ryan's camera turning even council-housing London into something optically enchanting. Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: Well-acted and grounded in reality. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: To hint that a heroine might have any flaws whatsoever would be just a bit too modern for this picture. Read more

Andrew Sarris, New York Observer: Sarah Gavron's Brick Lane, from a screenplay by Abi Morgan and Laura Jones, is based on the rapturously received 500-page first novel by Monica Ali. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: [A] quietly observant and quite beautiful adaptation of the Monica Ali novel. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: While the film tackles the issue of what the concept of 'home' means for expats and emigrants, it can also be seen as a coming-of-age story for a woman in her mid-30s. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: Brick Lane is about characters who have depth and reality, who change and learn, who have genuine feelings. And it keeps on surprising us, right to the end. Read more

Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: Brick Lane has beautiful scenery and some enjoyable moments but leaves the viewer feeling the need to find the book to get the rest of the story. Read more

Peter Schilling, Minneapolis Star Tribune: As the plot unfolds, it becomes apparent that director Sarah Gavron also finds attractive people more sympathetic, and this is Brick Lane's undoing. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

Susan Walker, Toronto Star: Kaushik is remarkable as Chanu, a role that demands he be a buffoonish, yet loving man, intelligent beneath his self-aggrandizing attitudes, oversized ambitions and determined cheerfulness. Read more

Hank Sartin, Time Out: Read more

Melissa Anderson, Time Out: Read more

Cath Clarke, Time Out: Gavron cleverly outlines the closed-in boundaries of Nazneen's Brick Lane. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: A sensitive and occasionally poetic film, Brick Lane is an absorbing tale of personal empowerment and emotional growth. Read more

Robert Koehler, Variety: Depth of character, such a distinctive quality of Ali's book, is sacrificed for simpler strokes and shallower dimensions, with an undue emphasis placed by helmer Sarah Gavron and lenser Robbie Ryan on gorgeous pictures. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: Brick Lane is a grown-up movie. It recognizes that there are different kinds of love and that some of them don't involve happily-ever-afters. Read more