Calorie is a film that only Eisha Marjara could have made. Now playing at the Carlton Cinema in Toronto, it’s a poignant and profound family drama weaving together intergenerational relations, diasporic reconnection with the homeland, and recent Canadian history. This feature film also addresses the cost of papering over the pain of separation from departed loved ones.
Marjara, an accomplished Canadian writer and director, brings a unique lens to Calorie as someone who lost her sister and mother in the bombing of Air India Flight 182 back in 1985. In addition, Marjara has deep insights into why teenage girls starve themselves, having done this herself. She capably chronicled this in her award-winning documentary short “Am I the Skinniest Person You’ve Ever Seen?”
In Calorie, one of the central characters, Alia (Shanaya Dhillon-Birmhan), appears upbeat and well-adjusted, but there’s a catch. She constantly counts calories, always trying to burn off more than she consumes. In light of the film’s title, this leaves viewers wondering where this obsession will lead.
Meanwhile, her older sister, Simi (Ashley Gainger), looks forward to moving out of home when she’s 18 to launch a musical career with her boyfriend. And their mother, Monika (Ellora Patnaik), is a stressed-out Montreal architect coping with an extremely heavy workload, single parenthood, and two daughters with minds of their own.
When Alia and Simi travel to Amritsar to visit their great-uncle Mohan (Anupam Kher) and great-aunt Gurdeep (Dolly Ahluwalia), it leaves Monika at home alone. This gives space for painful memories to emerge.
These parallel stories of Monika’s awakening and Alia and Simi gaining insights into their ancestral roots set the stage for the revelation of a harrowing family secret.
Watch the trailer (above) for Calorie.
Calorie cast impresses
Patnaik, as Monika, embodies the bristling energy of many second-gen Punjabi Canadians driven to succeed after their parents have moved from their homeland to Canada. And she is utterly compelling as Calorie reaches its crescendo. Another pleasant surprise is Sana Syed as the teenage Monika, who embodies the same intensity as Monika the adult.
Moreover, the veteran Bollywood actor Kher, as Mohan, strikes the right tone as the gentle Sikh elder full of compassion yet still vulnerable to his own weakness. Ahluwalia, another Bollywood veteran, is a commanding presence on-screen. And the two sisters’ relationship is convincing even as each is driven in different directions by their own impulses.
Marjara’s artistry as a filmmaker is not only evident in the casting. She also captures the different zeitgeists of Punjab and Canada—and not only architecturally. India is full of heart and spirituality, but cities also carry danger for young women, especially from deceitful and immoral men. Canada, in contrast, can feel like it’s a rule-based and highly secular society. Here, people pursue career success and a comfortable middle-class existence, sometimes forgetting what makes them human in the rush to make ends meet.
Calorie conveys all of this so well, sometimes in subtle ways. It’s a polished feature film that won Best Canadian Feature, as well as Best Canadian Actress and Director at IFFSA Toronto. Keep an eye out for it when the next Canadian Screen Awards nominations are announced.
Calorie is at the Carlton Cinema in Toronto. Learn more about the communities that make up Canada on the Toronto Spark website. The Toronto Spark is on Bluesky @torontospark.bsky.social.
