Mira Nair's latter-day US career, which has seen the poorly tailored megaflops of "Amelia" and "Vanity Fair" drown out the modest artistic triumph of "The Namesake" in the collective consciousness, may be seen by some as a cautionary tale for internationally-inclined filmmakers. It didn't seem so at its outset, however, as Nair followed the powerful, Oscar-nominated street study "Salaam Bombay!" with this sociologically tangy, genuinely unusual romantic dramedy. Probing the difficulties plaguing the relationship between an African-American (Denzel Washington) and a Ugandan Indian immigrant (Sarita Choudhury) with gentle precision, the film still seems an exotic flower over 20 years on, and Nair's recent "The Reluctant Fundamentalist" didn't come close to equalling it for pointed interracial observations.