Riz Ahmed, Liev Schreiber, Kate Hudson, and Kiefer Sutherland star in "The Reluctant Fundamentalist," based on the novel of the same name and directed by Mira Nair.
In 2011, an American professor in Pakistan is kidnapped. When the U. S. embassy receives a ransom note, it's in the form of a video, demanding the release of detainees and money.
An American journalist (Schreiber) who is a CIA informant obtains an interview with a suspect in the kidnapping, one Changez Khan (Ahmed), a professor at the same university. Changez asks to tell his story from the beginning.
He comes from a good family, his father a known poet, but money is scarce in his family. Changez wins a scholarship to Princeton and afterward is hired by a valuation firm on Wall Street.
Changez soon proves how gifted he is at the job, and his boss (Sutherland) puts him on the fast track for promotion.
Meanwhile, Changez meets a photographer, Erica (Hudson) and the two become involved, though she is not yet over the death of her fiancé. They break up after her art show, where he feels betrayed, as she used elements of their relationship.
After the World Trade Center falls, things change. Ahmed is strip- searched at the airport and interrogated. He is arrested upon leaving his office one day. He grows a beard, saying it reminds him of where he comes from, and it's no doubt an act of defiance.
After refusing to close a publishing house in Istanbul, Changez loses his job and returns to Pakistan. The question is, did he take up arms? After loving America, does he now hate it?
One reason Mira Nair made this film was to show another side of Pakistan, that of a vibrant country filled with youth and educated people, not simply a country filled with poverty and violence.
It's a thought-provoking film about the effect of terrorism on the innocent, not only in our country but in others as well. Ahmed, who wanted the American dream, becomes a victim of racial profiling, of suspicion, of fear.
The point that Ahmed makes is that every person is made up of many qualities, no one is just a criminal, a professor, a terrorist, and there are no simple answers.
The movie feels long, it's talky, but the acting is superb and draws you right into the film. When Ahmed goes back to Pakistan for his sister's wedding, he goes into a mosque. Without him speaking, you know he's thinking, maybe back here is where I belong.
It's one thing to be a terrorist, to be rooted out and arrested, but to leave a country because you don't feel you belong there any longer and no one wants you there is sad. Alas, it's been going on for centuries with no end in sight.
In 2011, an American professor in Pakistan is kidnapped. When the U. S. embassy receives a ransom note, it's in the form of a video, demanding the release of detainees and money.
An American journalist (Schreiber) who is a CIA informant obtains an interview with a suspect in the kidnapping, one Changez Khan (Ahmed), a professor at the same university. Changez asks to tell his story from the beginning.
He comes from a good family, his father a known poet, but money is scarce in his family. Changez wins a scholarship to Princeton and afterward is hired by a valuation firm on Wall Street.
Changez soon proves how gifted he is at the job, and his boss (Sutherland) puts him on the fast track for promotion.
Meanwhile, Changez meets a photographer, Erica (Hudson) and the two become involved, though she is not yet over the death of her fiancé. They break up after her art show, where he feels betrayed, as she used elements of their relationship.
After the World Trade Center falls, things change. Ahmed is strip- searched at the airport and interrogated. He is arrested upon leaving his office one day. He grows a beard, saying it reminds him of where he comes from, and it's no doubt an act of defiance.
After refusing to close a publishing house in Istanbul, Changez loses his job and returns to Pakistan. The question is, did he take up arms? After loving America, does he now hate it?
One reason Mira Nair made this film was to show another side of Pakistan, that of a vibrant country filled with youth and educated people, not simply a country filled with poverty and violence.
It's a thought-provoking film about the effect of terrorism on the innocent, not only in our country but in others as well. Ahmed, who wanted the American dream, becomes a victim of racial profiling, of suspicion, of fear.
The point that Ahmed makes is that every person is made up of many qualities, no one is just a criminal, a professor, a terrorist, and there are no simple answers.
The movie feels long, it's talky, but the acting is superb and draws you right into the film. When Ahmed goes back to Pakistan for his sister's wedding, he goes into a mosque. Without him speaking, you know he's thinking, maybe back here is where I belong.
It's one thing to be a terrorist, to be rooted out and arrested, but to leave a country because you don't feel you belong there any longer and no one wants you there is sad. Alas, it's been going on for centuries with no end in sight.