Family life and the immigrant experience are the focus of Mira Nair's engaging film, The Namesake. The movie, which skips between Calcutta and New York, is based on the bestselling novel by Jhumpa Lahiri.

In Calcutta, a marriage is arranged between Ashima (Bollywood star Tabu) and Ashoke (Irfan Khan), a young engineer who has moved to America. Seen through Ashima's eyes, the couple's move to New York -- in winter -- is a cultural slap in the face, but she slowly adjusts to this new culture while simultaneously maintaining the old. It's a balancing act conveyed with gentle humour, but Ashima's confusion and isolation come through loud and clear.

Eventually, Ashima and Ashoke have a son and a daughter and make a move to a suburban neighbourhood. As time passes, the focus of the film turns to the son, Gogol Ganguli (Kal Penn), who is determined to be 100% American.

Gogol and his sister are typical teenagers and keen to dodge their parents' old-world, old-fashioned influences.

Gogol (named after the Russian novelist) studies to become an architect and moves into adult life in Manhattan seemingly shed of all traces of his parents' culture. Certainly, he doesn't understand the significance of his name or how his father came to give him a name he can't wait to change.

His girlfriend (Jacinda Barrett) is a sophisticated New Yorker; she is also clueless about anything outside her own culture. Her encounters with Gogol's family are as cringe-inducing as you'd expect, but Nair has a delicate touch in all this, and the elements of cultural clash are subtle and often humorous.

Family tragedy leads Gogol back to his roots and eventually to a South Asian woman, but that's not a solution either. The Namesake is about the experience of being caught between two cultures, never feeling fully at home in either.

It's also a film about family. Gogol and his sister are raised to maintain the connection with family in Calcutta while also growing up with an enviable collection of "aunties" and "uncles" in the extended family his parents create in America. The story shows how much is lost in one generation.

The Namesake is an understated picture that draws a viewer completely into the world it presents. As the parents, actors Tabu and Irfan Khan give the sort of superb performances that carry the film over any weak spots, and Kal Penn is so good as Gogol that it's hard to believe he's best known for Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle.

Nair presents India, Calcutta especially, with fantastic colour and beauty and activity. America looks somewhat bleak in comparison.

It seems safe to assume that's not a mistake.
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