Mainstream movies reach more people and therefore any positive or negative consequences potentially that much greater, by orders of magnitude in many cases, although mercifully I suspect that very few people will see this one. (Hopefully they’ll buy Shaheen’s album instead.) And while Brooks does make himself the butt of many jokes, I don’t recall his Ugly Americanness to have been the object of any of them, really, at least not in any significant way. And I don’t know that I agree re: the Indian-Pakistani officials “being in charge” in that subplot — Brooks may have been Inspector Clouseau in that subplot, but the officials also come across looking pretty lame, like people who will accidentally go to war over a situation that was so obviously ridiculous. The subtext there is that Indians and Pakistanis hate each other so much that they barely need an excuse to go to war with each other, and won’t be bothered to investigate that excuse to make sure that it’s war-worthy. Ha ha ha, so funny.

Too bad you missed RDB — you’re right, though, that certainly was the biggest crowd I’ve ever seen at ImaginAsian. (When I saw Veer-Zaara there the audience had like 10 people.) Hopefully you can catch it somewhere else.

i’m super glad i am american and my skin color is american. i love me some merica right bout now (get back to me around Nov 06)

dehli is nice, i can relate to it, but as to it being my home, a place i can slip into to? nada, no dice. those real dehli-walay would show me a thing or two about delhi anytime i asked, or even if i didn’t. and they might take my money while they are at it, while i’m busy trying to figure out the exchange rate. while i know a bit about bollywood….an albert brooks movie is actually much, much, much more familiar to me. i know there’s this guy karan johar who does family-friendly movies i can almost like, but al brooks, i actually like.

ain’t that american, something to see.

well, it better be, because its the only country i have

We already know that– it’s an Albert Brooks movie

… especially in a movie that claims to be all about cross-cultural understanding… Instead, the movie seems to have taken its premise completely seriously…

No, bumbling Brooks was the butt of most of the jokes. It’s a movie mainly about Brooks and secondarily about the Ugly American and his lack of cultural understanding. Look at the India-Pakistan subplot where the officials are in control and Brooks is Inspector Clouseau / Inspector Gadget, it’s very clear.

… there was the “explosives school” gag, already noted above, but the film also portrayed every third Muslim as anti-Semitic in one way or another…

Yup, its treatment of Muslims is very hackneyed and slapstick. The bomb joke bugs me more from Shazia Mirza than from an American.

sure, there are regular people working in call centers now, but the portrayals don’t seem all that different from what we’re accustomed to…

The call center jokes here are a recurring gag in the background, not one-liners.

… obviously people in the Muslim world are capable of laughter as much as anyone else…

Yup, the title is silly and demeaning. It reminds me of Jackie Chan in Rush Hour– his first appearance on screen gets a Chinese gong on the soundtrack. Gag. But then a stoned Brooks chillin’ with Pakistani comedians while puffing the magic dragon…

Incidentally, I just saw “Rang De Basanti”… Go watch that film.

I would’ve, but it was sold out all weekend with a line that wrapped around the parking lot.

… I’m particularly surprised at your defense of the film given your reaction to that book cover…

Books are a far more subtle, though less visceral, medium than movies. The bar is higher for print, and higher still for a desi author.

I saw this movie and thought it was, by turns, stupid (as you note, the jokes pretty much all fall flat) and offensive, with stereotyped moments that made me wince, especially in a movie that claims to be all about cross-cultural understanding. The anti-Muslim moments among them were particularly troubling — there was the “explosives school” gag, already noted above, but the film also portrayed every third Muslim as anti-Semitic in one way or another, leaving Brooks (for goodness sakes) to portray himself as the enlightened, pluralistic, tolerant one by comparison. All of that was both gratuitous and ridiculous, and ultimately revealed the film to rest on rather demeaning premises.

It’s too bad because the film did have some potential. But instead of revealing its own premise as ridiciulous and a product of Western ignorance — because obviously people in the Muslim world are capable of laughter as much as anyone else, and what could have been shown as funny is the way in which it’s ridiculous for a bunch of Americans to assume otherwise. Instead, the movie seems to have taken its premise completely seriously, portraying Brooks as on a modern-day civilizing mission to teach a bunch of unfunny buffoons about sarcasm and how to be funny.

Soft orientalism updated for the age of globalization — sure, there are regular people working in call centers now, but the portrayals don’t seem all that different from what we’re accustomed to. Manish, I’m particularly surprised at your defense of the film given your reaction to that book cover last week

Incidentally, I just saw “Rang De Basanti” and was trying to think about whether your description of Bollywood (doesn’t show the streets of Delhi, only shows Eurotrash wannabes) rings true for that film, and I think the answer is maybe a little bit, but by and large no. You want to find comedy in the Muslim world? Go watch that film.

no offense, but i never realized that being desi was so much about popular culture. i mean i like my celebrity worship, but damn, you guys are about nothing else. can we get some posts about newer topics or is it going to be bollywood hollywood pantheon worship for all of my recurring lives?