Darjeeling Limited

Over the weekend I caught a perculiar little flick called Darjeeling Limited. This film is a tale of three brothers' journey via train through India to bond together and find spiritual awareness. Presented in a somewhat disjointed filming style, this two-part comedy is a good study on humanness and family interaction. The dry, subtle wit addressing typical, and not-so-typical, familial situations and common dysfunctional interactional traits of siblings had me giggling irreverently for most of the show. I was amused to watch the three brothers tussle believably over inconsequential matters in a scene involving "the best cough syrup India has to offer," "the best pain pills India has to offer," and pepper spray, which landed them stranded in the desert with their 11-piece matching set of outrageously flamboyant luggage, a printer and a laminating machine. The idiosyncrasies of the well-written script provided a lot of silence and facial expressions to relay the message. The "intermission" after the short portion at the beginning caught me complete off guard and I spent a bit of time trying to get back on my feet before I realized it was an intentional quirk and, eventually, the first part was tied into the second and it all made sense. I recommend this and, since it is not a huge "special effects" movie, you will not lose any of the impact if you catch it on DVD.