By Subhash K. Jha, Indo-Asian News Service
Film: "I: Proud To Be An Indian". Starring
Sohail Khan, Imran, Henna, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Aasif Sheikh, Mona
Ambegaonkar. Directed by Punnet Sira.
It's the ultimate colonial revenge. The clean righteous
brawny boy from Amritsar beats the Anglo-Saxon skinhead in London to
a battered and bellowing pulp.
It's a moment of heightened catharsis not only for the
petrified and persecuted Asians who egg on the human antidote to Briton's
bullying brigade, but also for us moviegoers who always like to see
the strong, silent, seething superhero deliver a blow-by-blow comeuppance.
The gory end of the white man is a truly clever finale.
Villains in Hindi movie are invariably from outside
- sleazeballs from Dubai and Bihar. Now, producer Sohail Khan takes
us to England to see what ails the noble Asian community there.
Skinheads! Bald pated, scowling, mean racists who hound
affable Saradrjis and their pregnant wives to their deaths. For the
benefit of the viewer in Amritsar and Patna there's a convenient voiceover
each time the Brit villains spew venom on the cowering Asians.
Unlike "Anita & Me" and other NRI films
about the diaspora, where references to racism were so muted that they
almost seemed apologetic, "I: Proud To Be An Indian" knows
exactly who its target audience is, and how to hold on to its interest
to the last dying drop....and thud.
"I.." is a very clever and mordant script
which turns a crucial migrants' problem into what the Brits would call
a jolly good yarn. In minting the masala element in the story, debutant
director Puneet Sira never for a second, lapses into the ludicrous or
the maudlin.
Welcome to the other kind of NRI cinema. Unlike Aditya
Chopra's "Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge" and the other posh
films about Indians abroad, this one dares to step into the slush without
mincing words. Wincing words, there are aplenty.
Says I (that's what Sohail Khan calls himself in the
film) to his new Pakistani friend Aslam (Imran): "We made the mistake
of falling into the British trap by dividing India into two. Now let's
not fall into their divide-and-rule trap again."
Migratory paranoia? Trap crap? Perhaps. But in its own
way, this brave and engrossing story makes a pitch for India-Pakistan
relations - not just the smacking lip service that the Indian boy provides
to his Pakistani girlfriend Noor (Henna) in the privacy of her brother's
gym.
Sira tells the migrant's tale with a great deal of kinetic
energy which never spills over into an overflow of fireworks until the
end, when the narration acquires the unapologetic texture of a climatic
battle between the bully and the hero.
The earlier sequences showing the Indians' encounters
with skinheads are eerily crafted. Sira never goes overboard. With the
help of some expert background music by Monty Sharma of "Devdas"
fame, the director puts forward the hapless immigrants' fearful journey
into a foreign land in a likeable blend of authenticity and dramatic
licence.
In an author-backed title role, Sohail Khan gets more
than just brawny points. His interpretation of the Punjabi boy's ire
at the racism (the last time we saw how middleclass Indians lived abroad
was in Rishi Kapoor's "Aa Ab Laut Chalen") doesn't require
a demoniacal display of histrionics. But it does require a sense of
controlled anger, reminicent of Sunny Deol in his best films.
The trademark Khan smile notwithstanding. Sohail proves
himself to be more than just a chip off the Salman block.
The other watchable performance comes from ever-dependable
Kulbhushan Kharbanda as Sohail's father. The sequence where after being
roughed by skinheads, Kharbanda sobs in the bathtub brings a goosebumpy
feeling to the taut drama.
But the rest of the cast remains largely shadowy. The
Pakistani side could've been better represented. Imran, with his absolutely
credible English twang who plays Sohail's Pakistani buddy, dies a sudden
death...not symbolic of India-Pakistan ties?
Apart from an aimless stretch after the intermission,
"I: Proud To Be An Indian" holds our attention from the petrifying
prologue to the cathartic conclusion. Yes, it's bloodied brutal and
violent at times. But it pulls no punches, makes no damaging digressions.
Nor does it get cutely romantic or unnecessarily songful.
Technically plush, the sound mixing and the dubbing
of all the voices - including the snarling skinheads - is flawlessly
credible. Dev Verma's cinematography captures London without getting
glamour-struck. This is the first mainstream Hindi film to go to England
without taking us sightseeing! How the Thames has changed!
When the savage skinhead Cain (Tim Lawrence) bashes
up Sohail there were a few shouts of "Call Salman!" in the
theatre. Also, some people think Sohail is too fair to look authentically
opposed to the white skins
So is this film worth a view? I, I, Sir!