Review of Polite Society, directed by Nida Manzoor

If you’re new here, and stumbled upon this blog through the mythical powers of the Internet, welcome! I know a lot of visitors to my website are people who randomly come upon this website through search engines like Google, but I also do have a lot of visitors who come back. Regardless: my name is Ashley, and I started this blog in order to keep track of everything I’m coming across in the world.

I feel like a lot of my blog introductions, especially when it comes to movies, have been lamenting on the fact I don’t have a ton of time lately. I used to work as a film critic (which, in fact, was so incredibly underpaid that I now make more off of this blog’s display ads than I ever did publishing anywhere else), and then when I was in graduate school I was writing a lot about film, so I used to watch so many movies.

But now I work an 8-5, come home, and then doom scroll my evenings away instead of watching the movies I used to love so dearly. And recently I realized I want to stop doing that, so I’ve set limits on my phone and am fully prepared to sit back and watch more movies and read more books in order to feed my brain.

And that’s how I ended up checking out a copy of Polite Society from my local library. I’ve tried to watch this movie multiple times in the past actually. I wanted to see if in theatres, missed that opportunity, then another time I tried to watch it on a flight home from London on British Airways and fell asleep.

So now was the time to actually watch this, and it was glorious. Let’s get into the review!

Martial arts enthusiast Ria Khan thinks her sister is marrying a bad man—and wants to stop the wedding before it’s too late.

Our main character in this movie is Ria Khan, who grew up in the Pakistani British community in London, although she’s anything but a typical Desi British girl. This teen loves martial arts from the bottom of her heart, and she wants to become just like her idol: the movie stunt performer Eunice Huthart.

Because of this, Ria trains and practices under the guidance of her older sister Lena. While their parents think Ria is just going through a phase and will instead become a doctor, Lena dropped out of art school and is someone who definitely needs some nudging in their eyes.

As Ria struggles with the local bully at school with her friends Clara and Alba, along with the fact that everyone under the sun wants her to become a doctor, an Eid party is in the works among the community. Their family is invited and Ria, who snoops around, realizes that the party is front for the matriarch of that family, Raheela, to find her son Salim a wife.

And much to Ria’s horror, Lena is one of the candidates for Salim’s hand. Lena is charmed by Salim and agrees to go on a date, ultimately leading her to agree to marrying him. Ria refuses to allow Lena to go through with this, leading to some major arguments and a rift between the two sisters.

Ria asks Clara and Alba to help her snoop around more. First they go on his laptop and are unable to find anything, but the next step is breaking into Salim’s room to plant used condoms on the ground. At that point Ria also is isolated from her friends, as she lashes out at them, and Saheela catches Ria in the act of vandalism.

The only evidence she found was his first wife, who died giving birth, and Lena tells Ria off. Ria decides to give up her martial arts, but then when she visits Raheela to apologize, she’s draggged off to a spa day. Raheela tortures Ria there and when she escapes, she finds a secret room where she learns Lena (and the other women at the party) were being evaluated for their fertility levels.

Unable to tell anyone, Ria enlists her best friends to help out out at the wedding. As Ria does a Bollywood style dance, Clara and Alba drug Lena and drag her out in a tea trolley, but Raheela captures Ria in a room. Turns out she wants to impregnate Lena with a clone of Raheela, which is an interesting twist.

The wedding starts, although Lena is quite drugged out at that part. The school bully, Kovacs, rescues the friends. Ria takes her guard’s gun and stops the wedding, revealing Raheela and Salim’s evil plan. At first, no one believes her, but then Lena remembers being drugged by Salim and he confesses his first wife died with the clone in her belly.

Raheela grabs the gun and holds everyone hostage, but then Ria’s family and friends fight off the guests and security while escaping. Lena and Ria have a final confrontation with Raheela, and Ria stops her with a reverse spinning kick.

The movie ends with the sisters making up and Ria finally getting a response from Eunice.

Overall Thoughts

I’ve always been intrigued by this movie, and not only is it so fun, but it bends genre and culture in a way that I haven’t really seen before. I haven’t seen any movies that focus on life in British-South Asian communities, and this is something I’ve actually wanted to explore more.

I can’t speak to the authenticity of this movie, obviously, but I thought that this did a great job showcasing these areas, culture, and way of life. Sure the martial arts and entire “impregnate with a clone” storyline are unrealistic, but it adds new depth to those genres as well.

This movie has some flaws, especially when it comes to the cliches, but I think it makes up for in heart. It’s not a perfect movie, but it certainly is a lot of fun to watch. Give it a chance if you haven’t already.

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