RASPBERRY MAGIC DATE: SATURDAY, MAY 1 TIME: 5:00 PM VENUE: DGA 2 BUY TICKETS ENCORE SCREENING DATE: THURSDAY, MAY 6 TIME: 9:00 PM VENUE: DWNTN BUY TICKETS

RASPBERRY MAGIC

(United States, 2009) Dir./Scr. Leena Pendharkar

Video, 88 min., color, narrative

The Shah family is in turmoil. Bills need to be paid, the house is falling apart, and the father just lost his job. He keeps it a secret at first by continuing to leave the house in the morning and returning to have dinner with his wife and two daughters in the evening. And then, one day, he has to explain why the kids see him hanging around in video stores all day long. And like their house, the family itself starts to fall apart.

Read an Interview with Leena Pendharkar on making RASPBERRY MAGIC.

But RASPBERRY MAGIC is not the story of a family’s decline. It centers around the bookish and charming character of 11-year-old Monica Shah who determinately believes in love and it’s power to not only reunite her family, but to allow her raspberry plants to grow faster. And of course, she is right. While her mother falls into a depression after her father has left and refuses to get out of bed, Monica has to take on the responsibility for the family. At the same time, she tries to win the school’s science contest in proving her hypothesis that human touch helps raspberry plants to grow faster. We intuitively know she is right, and yet it is difficult for Monica to provide visible evidence. Indeed, winning the competition moves to the background, and her project really becomes about upholding her faith in human love and bonds. As we come to learn later, the strength of her vision (both of life and of her project) stems from precious memories of the family picking raspberries in the past and of the feeling of happiness from being together. Yet, the berries embody less a vision of nostalgic idealization rather than “the perfect balance of sweet and sour, the good and the bad.”

RASPBERRY MAGIC delivers to us, then, an inspiring message about pursuing dreams even through – or especially in times of – struggle. And so it happens that father Shah finally gets the chance to work on his long-imagined video game, mother Shah succeeds in publishing her Indian food recipes, and the raspberries? Well… you better go and see yourself.
— Feng-Mei Heberer

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COMMUNITY CO-PRESENTER: Desi You; Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles