Film review: Bubbles - Looking in, looking out

Bubbles allows the viewer to look at domestic violence from a child’s perspective

Domestic violence in South Asian households has been a subject of one too many films. But what really drives the point home in Nasheed Qamar Faruqi’s short film Bubbles is how ugly that abuse looks to a child.

Set in a small apartment in London, the film explores the tense dynamic between a defeated wife (Shabana Azmi), her hostile husband (Bhaskar Patel), their son (Christopher Simpson) and docile granddaughter (Yasmeen Siddiqui). Given the somber nature of the subject, Faruqi could not have chosen a better cast as each of them delivers a sophisticated yet powerful performance. Azmi is unsurprisingly brilliant in her portrayal of a woman who checks off all the boxes for a good domesticated wife, but has lost her soul in the process. Everything, from her posture to the hollow look in her eyes, is on the money and breaks your heart. Patel skillfully plays a typical South Asian husband who growls and snarls within the confines of his home but transforms into a whimpering, submissive shadow of himself as soon as he leaves his comfort zone. Simpson delivers as the conflicted son, torn between respecting and defying a parent, and Siddiqui brings the right amount of innocence to the role of Bubbles.



Even though the film’s running time is barely 15 minutes, the tension in some of the scenes will leave you reeling for a few seconds. For instance, the lyrics from a famous Bollywood song that loosely translate to “imagine what it would feel if no one could enter or leave” playing through most of the film feels sinister. The lyrics seem fitting for a family that seems to exist in isolation from the outside world, but is bound by misery.



Given the film’s short format, the lack of backstory for each character is understandable. However, it does not stop you from wishing that Faruqi had revealed a little more. For instance, why does Azmi answer with just a sigh when Bubbles questions her about her parents’ whereabouts? Is Patel’s passive-aggressive behaviour hinting towards a greater power struggle faced by male immigrants who compensate for a lack of control over their alien surroundings by violently reinforcing their dominance at home? But perhaps that would have taken away from the film’s key message of forcing the audience to rethink violence within families and the impression it leaves on a young mind.



Published in The Express Tribune, Sunday Magazine, May 17^th, 2015.