Far from the television series in which a Matchmaker with International Clients including Indian-Americans, meets up with mostly educated, mostly well to do clients, though I believe one of the situations explored in this film is the daughter of that very same series Matchmaker, this documentary includes women in India who want to get married but are of modest means. It's tradition that the daughters leave home and go to the home of their new husband and usually her mother and father in law, where she is to please them. Though this is the tradition of the culture, and everyone knows how that goes, there is still great sadness when a loved daughter leaves home.
It's considered NOT NORMAL to be NOT MARRIED. And sadly, even intelligent, well educated women who have a career started are expected to give it all up. Education and independence make them undesirable. In one situation explored in this film the bride believes that she will perhaps have to give up her work and move to another city for her marriage but that she will be able to join her father-in-law and husband's company. Instead she has to give up modern clothing, wear saris every day, cover up in public, and do the family's political interests proud.
Perhaps the most horrifying to me was the Bombay Rotary Club meeting in which three potential brides got to meet a roomful of men, and the overweight woman was not selected by any of them.
Perhaps on the positive side, horoscopes are generally checked to see if the potential couple are a good match.
Of most interest to me was the woman who was a teacher of children, perhaps an only child in a modest family, In other words from a poorer family, a humble one. Yet years have gone by and at thirty she has not been married. She attempts to find her own mate using a dating site and the first man and his family come to meet her family. Though the two seemed to have interest in each other, it turns out they are all rejected because they are too poor for the other family, which causes the parents great distress and the woman a profound depression. She is a round woman but also pretty and seems to have a good personality. Finally she begins communication with another man from a dating site and this time she is successful. He is handsome, has a warm and wonderful personality, and seems to feel he is the luckiest man in the world. And so a happy ending... I loved when her dad burst out in tears because she was leaving home.
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