‘Curry’ in no hurry

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Vikram Chatwal’s One Dollar Curry finally posts a trailer and makes its lumpy appearance in London Sep. 23rd, a full year after its Paris debut (via AiM). Nip-slip dictates that we pixelate, you pervs.

Chowhounds take note — the concoction this character vends is true Punjabi-style curry. The plot is a Paris-based, cooking-centric takeoff on The Guru, the trailer features ‘Kamasutra’ body oil nestled in a leopard-print bikini, the site uses a cloying, annoying faux-Indic font, and Chatwal seems to have both a cross and ‘waheguru‘ tattooed to his right arm.

Despite these less-than-stellar atmospherics, the soundtrack is catchy, and the movie doesn’t seem as bad as it so richly deserves to be given the hackneyed plot and inexperienced cast. It’s got an adorable, Ganesh-painted three-wheeler, the incantation of a six-degrees family tree is dead on, and Gabriella Wright is surely one of the cutest English-Irish-Portuguese-Mauritians out there.

Watch the trailer or listen to the soundtrack. Here’s the official site. Previous post here.

57 thoughts on “‘Curry’ in no hurry”

  1. Still, the movie is likely to lead to self-conscious cringe-inducing moments if watched in a movie hall with non-brown people. I would find myself rushing to explain that we are not all that enamoured with curry, or for that matter with the Kamasutra. Yeah, 86 positions is all right, but it’s not like we need that to make us sexy. So don’t ask us about the Flying-Duck-fcuk.

  3. Ha!

    Interesting choice of image frpm film!!

    Almost like poster concepts from times-a-long-ago.

    Sumita.

  4. i don’t think that the image from the film gives a good impression of brown people. just because we live in the west doesn’t mean we should succumb to its loose morals and lascivious climate. whether hindu, sikh, muslim, christian or unbeliever we brown people believe in certain moral precepts.

    as i always say, more A+s, not T&A.

  6. yeah, good impression, whatever it stands for.

    I thought it seemed like, come watch the film,

    It has sex, It has religion

    (with drum beats in the background)

    Very funny thought!! people do see films for other reasons, or dont they? Nah! What am I talking about?

    Still amused

    Sumita

  7. OK, and help me out here. Am chronologically challenged

    Isnt Vikram chatwal the guy who is in the “happpenings in town” pics in Cosmo?(Or am i mixing him up?)

    He is now an actor? (Suitable date for Paris Hilton, no?)

    Sumita

  8. as i always say, more A+s, not T&A.

    Right on brother ! Shedding your clothes does make you progressive or sleeping in your own vomit does not make you Liberal. I disagree oh to say that Western Culture is not morale is is highly morale ( for example Political Correctness or Multiculturalism) that we should be thankful for. Its just that the easy hedonistic delights of maya have eclipised the true profound pleasures of intellectual inquiry or ethical conduct

    “It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both sides. ” (John Stuart Mill Singh)

  12. Hey that’s why I’m the fudamentalist pofaced moralist and uncleji is the fun loving (but amorale) fella. You will be relieved that like my uncleji I regard Spelling as a unwanted impendiment to my creative flow:

    See !look ! Mill is protype for the overacheiving Indian:

    His feats as a child were exceptional; at the age of three he was taught the Greek alphabet and long lists of Greek words with their English equivalents. By the age of eight he had read Aesop’s Fables,

    This intensive study however had injurious effects on Mill’s mental health, and state of mind. At the age of 21 he suffered a nervous breakdown.

  13. Hey nephew

    You got a name?(rather than be content to live in uncleji’s shadow?) Nice points you make.

    Sumita

  14. Well I love the picture of brown on brown love above!

    Oi! As a defender of white on brown love (and green on purple, and everything else, despite Razib telling us we’re immunologically incompatible) 😉 let me remind you she’s “English-Irish-Portuguese-Mauritian” and thereby not brown in the Asian sense. 😉

    Other than that, the movie looks rubbish, the same plot as every other indie brown movie. But I totally want a Ganesha rickshaw, yo.

  16. Other than that, the movie looks rubbish, the same plot as every other indie brown movie. But I totally want a Ganesha rickshaw, yo.

    Amen! (or tathastu)to that!!

  17. PB

    I wondered where one had seen her before. Thank you!! (Is raat ki subah nahin, really nice film)

  18. Other than that, the movie looks rubbish

    Yeah – I am sick to death of the obligatory wedding/dancing scene when all the plot threads come together, the garish colours, the oh-so-funny outrageous culture clash comedy as Uncleji discovers his son is a transvestite or whatever, the kitschy bollywoody in the West irony, the pandering to white peoples stereotypes, the camp ‘celebration of multicultural life’, the ‘uplifting’ message of ‘liberation’ and the colours oh damn you stop with the colours!

    Just one movie that is fresh and not so self conscious and isnt made for Guardian readers would be good please.

  19. PB

    Just one movie that is fresh and not so self conscious and isnt made for Guardian readers would be good please.

    Like?

    and how about making a list of the stupidities in these (indie brown)movies? We could send it to filmmakers on “what not to do” What say?

    Am with you on

    and the colours oh damn you stop with the colours!

    Really!! Enough already.laughing Sumita

  20. But I totally want a Ganesha rickshaw, yo.

    oooi I don’t like that its like its eyes are following me around. Like that picture of Bhabji on the mantlepiece next to Auntieji collection of porcelain figures.

    I’m all for miscegenationalism on the following basis:

    1) I get some 2) It don’t involve the Auntieji or any female members of my family 3) That the people mentioned in (2) remain unaware of (1) Double Standards are the dark underbelly of what is funloving creed of Unclejism.

    I’m sure the greater miscegenationalist of all time was Captain Kirk ! Man that guy really didn’t care what he poked & his kids really were mixed race

  22. Punjabi Boy,

    There were some good desi-themed dramas on British TV last year. Remember “Second Generation”, along with that (I think) Chaucer-based gangster drama starring Om Puri and Indra Verma. I think both broke a lot of stereotypes and were quite innovative.

    A full-scale movie for the cinema along those kind of lines would be good.

  23. PB- and the REALLY bad acting. I suffered through “Green Card Fever” and “Indian Fish in American Waters” and I’ve seen better acting chops in a community theatre in Ohio. Ugh.

    It’s so formulaic, I can just stop seeing all these Confused Curry Chai Colour movies altogether…

    Sumita Auntie– Chatwal is the same proprietor of the boutique hotel Dream in midtown.

  24. DD

    There is a pic of him with ms Hilton. I made that up, thinking it was a possibility.

    Sahi hai!!

    Sumita

  26. This Vikram guy is completely arrogant. Did you read that article where he makes narrow-minded generalizations about women of different nationalities? i.e. Indian women want to talk about kids and marriage before the first date? Thanks, but no thanks.

  27. There were some good desi-themed dramas on British TV last year. Remember “Second Generation”, along with that (I think) Chaucer-based gangster drama starring Om Puri and Indra Verma. I think both broke a lot of stereotypes and were quite innovative.

    Jai

    Are these available on DVD/VHS? (am interested in watching this kind of stuff)

    Sumita

  28. This Vikram guy is completely arrogant. Did you read that article where he makes narrow-minded generalizations about women of different nationalities? i.e. Indian women want to talk about kids and marriage before the first date? Thanks, but no thanks.

    That same guy is now importing a wife from Mumbai.

  30. Sumita,

    Yes they can be ordered on DVD:

    Second Generation (Stars Parminder Nagra of “ER” and “Bend it like Beckham” fame — although believe me, you’ve never seen her like this before):

    http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0009KA7EA/102-7168488-1088927?v=glance#product-details

    (There are some reviews of the drama further down the page too).

    The Canterbury Tales (Om Puri, Indra Verma, and Nitin Ganatra [from Bride & Prejudice — he played the hilarious Mr Kohli]) — Re-vamped “modern” version of 6 stories, one of which “The Miller’s Tale” is the mini-movie staring Om Puri etc. It’s basically a film noir and I think it would have made a brilliant full-length cinematic release if they’d made it as such. I don’t think you can buy this episode individually (not sure); as far as I know you can only get the box set of all 6 episodes:

    http://www.moviemail-online.co.uk/filmsRM/95844

    http://www.blockbuster.co.uk/searchandbrowse/productinformation.aspx?productID=105708&href=%2fsearchandbrowse%2fproductsearchresults.aspx%3fstar%3dOm+Puri%26pageindex%3d0

    Here’s a very good article summarising the storyline, with interviews of the main actors/actress and some pictures too:

    http://www.asiansinmedia.org/news/article.php/television/126

  31. I saw this movie at the south asian film fest in toronto a few weeks ago… honestly, it COULD BE the dumbest movie ive ever seen in my life

    Chatwal cant act (he was actually there, he admitted to phoning it at times in in the Q&A afterwards), the plot wasnt really a plot, it was as if they made it up as they went along, you’ll laugh a lot, but only in wonder at how this thing actually got made

    man, words cant even describe how insipid this movie was, it was unreal

  32. Jai

    Thanks a lot for this. I will order both. (They sound exactly the kind of stuff I have been looking for)

    I think Parminder Nagra has tremendous potential. (BBLB did not even scratch the surface) so yes, I would be very itnerestedd in seeing more of her in a more powerful role

    Gurinder Chaddha’s work(and Mira nair too) suffers from some interesting limitations (my personal opinion) to do with undefined identities, and seem to pander to many stereotypes. hence am left feeling a little cheated when I watch films like that, even though among all the “desi genre” they seem to stand out.(unfortunately)

    “Bride” (I felt) was an amusing embarrassment.Of course Ash’s big fan following brought it the required success but…..

    Sumita

  34. Manish

    You could be right! But it looks like Smriti Mishra and she has a hot scene in the movie I saw of her called Jaya Ganga and I like those lips and hips.

  36. PB

    and, is Jaya Ganga any good? (I think I need to go looking for some films today. Thanks guys.)

    Sumita

  38. Sumita

    Yes, actually Jaya Ganga is worth watching – but – you might think it falls into the category of Exotica-India look at the Sadhus and Mandirs kind of thing because the story is of an Indian writer from Paris travelling along the Ganges to Varanasi and on his way falls in love with Smriti Mishra who is a courtesan – so it can be seen to have this mystical vibe stereotype thing going on but I reckon with those things its how it is handled isnt it? I mean the fact is that Hindus do travel to Varanasi because it is their spirituality and interest so the question is, is it exoticised or written believably? Why not make a film about this guy’s pilgramage? It has good photography and music and Smriti Mishra is very very good in it – definitely worth watching. Very poetic film.

  39. Apologies — the episode of The Canterbury Tales with Om Puri etc is actually called “The Sea Captain’s Tale”.

    This was also very good — it was a (obviously fictionalised) full-length film called Yasmin, about a westernised British Pakistani woman living in the north of the UK — one of those towns with a huge Muslim population — around the time of 9/11, and what happens to her and her family. It was excellent — she has a younger brother who gradually gets dragged into the whole global jihad / terrorist-training-camps-overseas thing, and was horribly prescient of what happened w.r.t the London bombings in July this year. It stars Archie Punjabi who played Parminder Nagra’s elder sister — the one who got married — in Bend it like Beckham.

    http://www.virginmegastores.co.uk/entertainment/dvd/66151-dvd-feature-film-dvd-yasmin-dvd.html

    http://www.moviemail-online.co.uk/films/14345

    Here’s an article about from the BBC website:

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/film/4685965.stm

    And here are some reviews:

    http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0420333/

  40. Punjabi Boy Are we going to do epic about the Heathrow Strike or not. Needless to say I leave the casting Couch to your expert eye and the witty one liners to your pen. I shall restrict myself to fiddling the expenses and stuff the crowd scenes with members of my vast family.

  41. PB

    I checked out the filmmaker’s website and am going to see the film/read the book. (am hooked)It will be interesting to see Singh, a JNU Historian’s (Marxist?) look at a mystical topic. Has to be compelling.

    wow!! I hadnt even heard of this film!! (Now this is why it isnt great to be an auntie)

    Sumita

  43. Uncleji

    The Heathrow-Desi film that needs to be made is about one of the robberies – every year there is at least one bunch of Southall boys gets busted for planning to rob gold bullion or dollars from there.

  45. One of the best films I saw in recent times about the angst of youth was “Hazaron Khwahishein Aisi”

    Its about three students in Delhi University before the imposition of Emergency in 1976, their choices tribulations, idealism or practicality. No known actors but brilliant film.Also by Sudhir Mishra.

    (Those Naxalites do exist for real. there were a few in my college, who despite brilliant career potential gave it up to work in villages, much after the emergency.) Interesting look at how the desi students deal with issues of idealism and angst(as opposed to NRI counterparts)

    http://www.hkathefeature.com/home.htm

    Sumita

  47. your heathrow movie has already been made (from redhotcurry.com)

    TRIADS, YARDIES AND ONION BHAJEES – Ethnic crime caper to represent Britain at Cannes 2003 (March 12 2003) Dubbed as a multicultural gangster movie, British Asian film ‘Triads, Yardies and Onion Bhajees’, by London-based director Sarjit Bains, is expected to take this year’s Cannes Film Festival by storm as it has been selected to represent British Independent Cinema. The Cannes Film Festival runs from May 14th – 25th 2003.

    Competing for the Cannes Festival’s 2003 Palme d’Or award, the film has done much better than the series of British flops last year and has even been singled out as a possible winner.

    The poignant story of a hitman who must kill friends and enemies to get the girl, the film stars real life ex-gangster and underworld don Dave Courtney. Brainchild of Manish Patel, who plays the role of ‘Singh’, the hitman in the movie, ‘Triads, Yardies and Onion Bhajees’ got widespread acclaim when it was showcased in a recent BBC2 documentary.

    The film draws upon the imagery of Hindu deity ‘Kali’, traditionally invoked to vanquish evil, with the three gangs being likened to modern day “thugees” (Kali worshippers of old).

    FILM SYNOPSIS This ain’t ‘Bend it Like Beckham’… this ain’t ‘East is East’…this is Southall!

    Welcome to London, home of many creeds and cultures. The modern criminal underworld reflects the diverse races that call London home.

    West London is ruled by the ‘Holy Smokes’ crime syndicate. At their head is the ruthless Chacha (Jas Vassi). His mob include the psychopathic killer Rocky (Sukie G), the drug addict Abz (Fran Labbe) and the gentleman gangster Jaz (Ashvin Joshi). To enforce his rule over his minions Chacha uses Singh (Manish Patel), his most trusted and ruthless hitman. Although the Holy Smokes rule all of West London, their base is Southall, the stronghold of the Asian community.

    North London is the territory of the Triads. These ruthless Chinese gangsters will do anything to protect their honour. Leading them is the young Billy Chan (Peter Peralta). An outsider has killed one of his men Li Fung (Alex Fung) and Billy swears vengeance! Among Billy’s army of thugs is Ho Lin Wun (Ernesto Leszek) the ruthless assassin who likes to cut his enemies fingers off for pleasure and amusement.

    South London is governed by the Yardies, the Jamaican mafia. At the head of this notorious crew is Lloyd (Native). This gang lives purely for the day and their motto is “Live Fast and Die Young!”. Utterly without fear, Lloyd hangs with his trusted men Rufus (Richard Angol) and Errol (Charles Udemezue). However, there is a thorn in Lloyd’s side – his sister, Tia (Jamille Riverol) lives with rival gangster Jaz from the Holy Smokes.

    East London is home to ‘the Firm’. The last stronghold of the original Anglo-Saxon cockney gangsters, the Firm is ruled by Mad Dave (Dave Courtney). They cannot understand how London has come to be ruled by the ethnic mobsters. They will not give up East London without a fight to the death. Mad Dave makes the Holy Smokes an offer they cannot refuse but one of his men Big Kev (Peter Rnic) has other ideas.

    Someone is muscling on the Holy Smokes cocaine deals and they are not amused. Added to this deadly event is the theft of six million dollars from Heathrow Airport making an explosive cocktail! Hot on the trail of the missing money is the Metropolitan Police’s most corrupt officer Detective Inspector Greaves (Jonathan Reason). It’s a roller-coaster ride as the Holy Smokes wage war against the Triads, Yardies and the Firm…

    THE GODDESS KALI IN THE MOVIE ‘Triads, Yardies and Onion Bhajees’ is primarily an action movie but it has a mythological and spiritual vein running through it. The character of Chacha (Jas Bassi) worships the Hindu Goddess Kali. We see a statue of Kali in his home. Chacha is seen praying to the Goddess in a Temple. At his office headquarters, again we see the statue of Kali.

    Chachas influence and teachings have also influenced members of his gang. The image of Kali can be seen in the homes of Rocky (Sukie Ghajminger) and Abz (Fran Labbe). A picture of the Goddess takes pride of place in Jas’ (Ashvin Joshi) wine bar. The smoke emanating from the incense surrounding the Kali statue in the temple is deemed to be holy, hence Chacha has named his crime syndicate “The Holy Smokes”.

    An interesting twist in ‘Triads, Yardies and Onion Bhajees’ is Chacha’s relationship with the two women in his life. His daughter Kalwe (Ines) is clearly worshipped by Chacha as the benign form of Kali (Dakshina) while his unnamed mistress (Patricia Arteaga) is seen as the fearful form of Kali (Smashan).

    It is very clear that the Goddess Kali is watching the proceedings unfold before her and ultimately will decide who lives and who dies.

    THE CAST

  48. clearly no-one here has seen the disaster that was “chutney popcorn”

    ok it’s about an indian lesbian – the sisters need representation – i get it… but really, the artificial insemination was highly unnecessary.

    ick.

  50. Well my Boy A desi film seemed the best place to stash all that ill black money to hide it from the taxman 😉