Directed by Roshan Sethi
Written by Roshan Sethi and Karan Soni
Starring Karan Soni and Geraldine Viswanathan
Unrated
Runtime: 1 hour 26 minutes
Streaming at Tribeca Festival starting June 11

by Audrey Callerstrom, Staff Writer

Ravi (Karan Soni) and Rita (Geraldine Viswanathan) sit down for a date. He’s arranged a picnic at what he understood to be a nice body of water with fish, but is actually a smelly reservoir with a receding waterline. He apologizes. They both feel awkward. It’s March 2020, so they’re both wearing their masks. It was when we knew to be scared of something, but not sure why. It’s hot and Ravi is sweating. “This is just like India!” He laughs as he dabs away sweat. They stumble through conversation about how their traditional Indian parents set them up via an online dating service. Their parents wrote their profiles. “Ravi has asthma and he was fat as a kid so diabetes is a concern,” reads Ravi’s mother in a voiceover. Then the alerts start coming through their phones. The NBA cancels their season. There’s a shelter in place order. Ravi, who is visiting California on a work trip, can’t get a rental car. He’s forced to shelter in place with Rita, who lives nearby.

7 Days is able to coast on the dynamic between Rita and Ravi. It’s a modern twist on “The Odd Couple,” strangers who are thrust into living together. Ravi finds out that Rita’s not the traditional Indian girl her profile made her out to be. She cusses, she drinks booze, she’s not vegetarian. There’s fried chicken in the fridge. She’s vulgar. As soon as she gets home, she ditches her modest dress for sweats and logo shirts that say things like QUESO QUEEN. Meanwhile, Ravi is embraces tradition. Karan Soni, who has more than 70 credits to his name but is perhaps known best as Dopinder, the driver in the Deadpool films, brings his signature deadpan delivery and charming “aw shucks” demeanor. It’s what makes him such an asset in other Duplass-produced films like Safety Not Guaranteed. He’s funny but he never lets on that he knows that he’s funny. “When I feel a rush of happiness I feel worried the happiness will be taken away from me so I distract myself,” Ravi says as he spontaneously starts doing jumping jacks. Geraldine Viswanathan (Blockers) gets some good lines as well. She has an aversion to cooking – she doesn’t even know where her stove is under all her junk. When Ravi asks her if she likes pasta, she replies, “I can eat a pound or two.”

The energy between the two leads is depleted when Rita, for unnecessary dramatic purposes, is stricken with COVID. This could have been a swift movie where these two leads get to know each other, bicker, fight, and make up. We don’t need to see them fall in love, but we want to see them be together. 7 Days, which is the amount of time Ravi’s parents spent together before getting married (and is about how long Rita and Ravi are quarantined for), turns schmaltzy. The standard beats, music, and shots are here. Loud drums to produce tension; sentimental, soft piano for when things turn sincere. Shots of sunbeams coming through a kitchen window, hanging pots and pans, Rita’s stuffed animals. We’re never in the hospital with Rita, we’re only experiencing it through Ravi’s eyes, and we only see her as they FaceTime. Sadly the movie deflates at this point and never recovers.

Up until that point, it’s an easy-to-watch crowd pleaser about two people with very different approaches to tradition. Ravi likes the idea of an arranged marriage; although his parents are divorced, they married seven days after they met (hence the title of the film). Rita thinks marriage is a sham. Rita lets Ravi loosen up, thanks to a spiked drink, but she’s not a “Manic Pixie Dream Girl.” They grow to care about each other, but they are ultimately not compatible, and the script recognizes that. Director Roshan Sethi makes good use of being confined to a small space. So we’re not just looking at windows and blank walls, every surface of Rita’s apartment is piled with stuff, from bags and clothes to little horse figurines which carefully line her mantle and desk. 7 Days gives us a diverse perspective of the traditional indie rom-com, and these are two terrific comic actors, but it drags in its hokey and sentimental second half.

See all of our Tribeca 2021 coverage here.