The Lunch Date

The Lunch Date

Film: The Lunch Date

Director: Adam Davidson

Duration: 10: 23 Min.

Language: English

‘The Lunch Date’ gives an introduction to the dry attitude of the white society towards the black Americans, where the perception of a middle aged woman is analyzed via the race factor existing in the society. The story is set in 1940s at the Grand Central Station, where a woman is rushing towards her train stuffed with her shopping bags. Within the gush of crowd, she collides with a passing black gentleman & misses her train in the rush of things. While she sighs at the wailing train, she realizes that her wallet is missing. She throws a scrutinizing attitude to the blacks around her and decides to walk to a nearby cafeteria. With some leftover change, she manages to buy a bowl of salad, but finds a fat black guy hogging on her salad vigorously. As the guy sits and eats off her salad, she stares furiously at him with heart full of hatred for the blacks. Her stomach constantly growls with hunger burning her till head. She hastily sits up with the black guy & takes a famishing bite, giving a sudden emotional as well as satirical kick to the audience. She ends up sharing the food with the black man, whilst each bite lightens up the weight of hatred in her. To post mark the meal, the black buys her back some coffee. The lady leaves the café in dilemma & surprise. It is revealed only a little later that she sat on the wrong booth and her salad was still lying on the same booth she left her packet.

Now whether the director has left a loophole here or he’s done it on purpose, that towards the end, when she walks out of the door, she still doesn’t react to a black beggar (Suggestions are invited in comments). The audience may find it absurd to see the harshness of the woman who actually eats off a homeless man’s lunch or even take it in a sensible manner as she actualizes the whole incident and laughs out loud at the café. This film has proved to stand as a powerful medium for the discrepancy between the black & white people that caused distress and annoyance among all. No matter what sect, race or creed one belongs to, the biggest identity of a human being is empathy as well as humanity.

You might wonder: This story was remade as ‘Rice Plate’ by an Indian Director ‘Rohit Roy’ in ‘Dus Kahaniyaan’.