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By Lisa Tsering

From India-West April 1999

Imagine Indian tradition and Western individuality colliding at the speed of light: Chutney Popcorn, the latest film from director Nisha Ganatra, pits two sisters — the “good” Sareeta (Sakina Jaffrey), an obedient young bride, and the “bad” Reena (Ganatra), openly gay with an American girlfriend, no less — in a comic look at nineties family life.

Chutney Popcorn also stars eminent Indian actress Madhur Jaffrey, Jill Hennessy (NBC’s “Law and Order”) and Ajay Naidu, star of the NBC series “Lateline” and the recent Office Space (I-W, March 5). How will this offbeat, funny film do with Indian audiences, who are more accustomed to seeing a heroine dancing around a tree than gunning a Harley?

“I hope they’re going to love it,” Madhur Jaffrey told India-West by phone from New York. “I think (Nisha) has great potential and I hope she’s going to be one of the great Indian directors in America.”

Ajay Naidu, too, praised Ganatra. “It was excellent,” Naidu told India-West of the experience. “I think she’s going to be doing a lot in upcoming years; I think she’s asking the right questions.”

Ganatra, 27, sees the film’s exposure at festivals such as the recent Los Angeles Independent Film Festival as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to expose ABCD (American Born Confused Desi) culture to mainstream cinema culture, but admitted that she needs support from the Indian community to make it all happen.

“There hasn’t been a film like this before,” Ganatra said. “We’re looking for a distributor, but some of them have said there’s no audience for this kind of film.” If a sizable enough Indian American audience shows up to the screenings, distributors said, she’d have a shot at some funding. Who wouldn’t be anxious?

“If (Indian Americans) want to see more films like this, we need their support,” she said.

Ganatra got her first glimpse of fame with the wryly comical Junky Punky Girlz, one of four films she directed while at New York University’s Graduate Film school.

It may take longer to read off the list of Girlz’s awards and acclaims than to sit through the 12-minute-long film itself: NYU’s prestigious Tisch Fellowship, Grand Prize for Most Outstanding Short Film of the Year from the PBS series “In the Life,” a trip through the United Kingdom with the British Film Institute’s Best of the Festival tour, a national tour with Cinevision’s Best of the Fest, the Max Factor Filmmaker Award at the New York Women’s Film Festival, the Athena Award from Northern Arts Entertainment, and inclusion in more than two dozen national and international film festivals. She also won the Warner Brothers Production Award for her film work in 1999.

Born in Vancouver, Ganatra studied with directors Spike Lee and Martin Scorcese at NYU before working in Lucasfilms’ THX department on Schindler’s List and When a Man Loves a Woman, and even survived a stint as a personal assistant in the tumultuous household of TV stars Roseanne Barr and Tom Arnold (no comment, thanks to a hefty privacy disclosure agreement, Ganatra explained).

Her greatest inspiration? Spike Lee, who has offered his support; the hilarious, skewed vision of Spanish director Pedro Almodovar; Jane Campion, director of The Piano and Sweetie; and even Roseanne and Tom, who gave their blessings to her fledgling film career.

The original music score for Chutney Popcorn is also to the left of mainstream, explained Ganatra: Naidu hooked her up with Kirsh Kale, a stellar young tabla player who has worked with Talvin Singh, the hip hop group Cypress Hill and many others, and who contributes a unique and modern fusion sound to the film. Ganatra co-wrote the film with Chutney producer Susan Carnival.

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