I want my films to explode with life. aMira Nair. This the first book to examine the films of the acclaimed and popular Indian-born and Harvard educated filmmaker Mira Nair. A unique voice in cinema today she is one of the few female directors who made it to the top of a male-dominated profession. Her films feature an incomparably sensuous visual style yet at the same time often record the injustice of the disenfranchised and the cross-pollination of East and West. Her twin themes of realism and romance make for dazzling cinema.THJohn Kenneth Muir analyzes all of Nair's work including:THU ESalaam Bombay!E (1988) the groundbreaking story of a young boy abandoned by his family on the streets of Bombay.THU EMississippi MasalaE (1991) an interracial small town romance between an Indian woman (Sarita Choudhury) and an African American businessman (Denzel Washington).THU EMonsoon WeddingE (2001) featuring a Bollywood carnival atmosphere one of the most successful foreign films ever released in the United States.THU EHysterical BlindnessE (2002) the HBO film featuring Uma Thurman and Juliette Lewis looking for love in all the wrong places.THU The big-budget Hollywood adaptation of the Thackery novel EVanity FairE (2004) starring Reese Witherspoon Gabriel Byrne and Eileen Atkins.