ALERT VIEWER Brick Lane: Drama. Starring Tannishtha Chatterjee, Satish Kaushik and Christopher Simpson. Directed by Sarah Gavron. (PG-13. 102 minutes. At Bay Area theaters.)

Say what you want about the Brits, their lack of good cuisine, inferior dental care and inability to field a decent bobsledding team. They really do know how to put together a fantastic-looking slum. The tenement housing depicted in "Brick Lane" is like the Disneyland of slums. This will be the first time that a movie inspires people to call their travel agents and book a transcontinental flight to a ghetto.

Or maybe it's just the talents of director Sarah Gavron and her cinematographer, Robbie Ryan, who make the outdoor farmers' markets, old buildings and rundown parks feel like a trip on a gondola through Venice. From the moment our heroine travels from Bangladesh to the eastern end of London, this is a very beautiful movie to watch.

Unfortunately, the screenplay based on Monica Ali's book is fractured, which almost always happens when you take a 448-page novel and try to cram it into a 102-minute movie. "Brick Lane" has beautiful scenery and some enjoyable moments but leaves the viewer feeling the need to find the book to get the rest of the story.

Tannishtha Chatterjee gives a quiet and almost too understated performance as Nazneen Ahmed, a Bangladeshi girl who is forced into an arranged marriage with a man twice her age (and about five times her size). After buying a sewing machine to pick up some spare work - that may be the boldest decision she has made in her life - she meets a handsome young clothing dealer, and a subtle romance develops. Meanwhile, the political climate of the neighborhood is changing, with some of the immigrants choosing to fight back against an established group of Muslim-hating ruffians.

Characters are introduced and then seen only one or two more times, plot developments are wrapped up too quickly and the overall story arc is so rushed that at times "Brick Lane" seems like more of a trailer than a movie. Gavron captures a lot of subtleties, exploring the complexities of arranged marriage without damning the practice outright. But even when things are going well in the moment, the big picture seems only semi-complete.

While the script is inconsistent, Gavron and Ryan almost always tell a compelling story with the visuals. Locals angrily protested the making of this film, which seems insane once you've seen the finished product. Even tenement rooms with the ugliest wallpaper and dingy alleys with no redeeming value seem beautiful - with some scenes literally being shot through a filter of colorful fabric.

The acting has its highs and lows, with memorable performances for both the right and the wrong reasons. Christopher Simpson as the love interest is a disappointment - while his accent may be accurate, he still seems like a middle-class kid doing an Ali G impersonation. Satish Kaushik is much, much better as Nazneen's optimistic and borderline delusional husband. The writing and acting mesh perfectly with his character, which is slovenly and a bit of a coward, but he still manages to have a few unexpected scenes of nobility.

-- Advisory: This film contains strong language and sexuality, including an unbelievable hot-girl-with-homely-guy match that falls somewhere between the Katherine Heigl/Seth Rogan romp in "Knocked Up" and the Carrie Fisher/Jabba the Hutt pairing in "Return of the Jedi."