http://www.jaman.com/a/download/?f=punching-at-the-sun

Everyone who has a chance must see it .. White .. Black .. Indian .. whatever !

Filmiholic, I think what BS is getting at is how repetitive and cliched the depiction of desi life and desi men is in terms of diaspora cinema. It looks like this movie may well address this problem, though, and that is one reason why I’d love to watch it.

I know where BS is coming from. Many cliched stereotypes constantly filtered through the culture can grate the nerves. Can you blame desi men or women for feeling that? Don’t African Americans have issues with their depiction? Or Asian Americans, for example? That’s what I hated about Ninas Heavenly Delights - I predicted every single scene of it from the start. The trouble is that some diaspora films pander to mainstream society’s perceptions of who we are — so throw in the exotica, the arranged marriage dilemma, the curry, the camp bollywood posturings, and depict desi men in the most cliched and demonising way (you know, emasculated, repressive) You should be grateful that people like BidiSmoker are out there chomping at the leash to question these tropes —- good art comes about when people want to challenge prejudices and dead depictions.

I hope this movie is released in the UK. Seems like some good stuff is beginning to emanate from the brown diaspora in the USA. In the UkKwe are stuck in the rut of pandering to the white mainstream audiences desire for depictions of dysfunction and the desire to have their liberal hatreds of desi men confirmed.

As you can see, I don’t think the Indian-American community has been well represented in any film yet. This is a sentiment shared by most Indian-American people I know. I would like to see the films you mention, but I suspect my experience of them would be very different than your own, as I would be able to tell what rings true to me. I have not read either of the authors you mention, I mostly read Modernists and I haven’t really heard of those guys, but I will check them out. As for your final question, pressed to give an answer I would say no one, but Nair has the potential to do so with the right script. I’m sure there are hundreds of others like me out there trying to produce it.

I have no doubt that the rate of intermarriage is higher in the Indian-American community than among 1st genners settling here, it makes complete sense, no? Out of curiosity, where do you get your figures from?

As for parents not being thrilled about intermarriage, I never said that the number of Indian parents who react negatively is higher than any other group. Most parents, I’d guess 90%, of any nationality or ethnic group would prefer their child marry the same as they are.

So we’re in total agreement there.

On the 3 movies I mentioned, none of them really dwell on difficulties that any oppressed person has had to overcome. In Hiding Divya, Madhur Jaffrey’s character seems to have had a comfortable middle class life in her second marriage. My Bollywood Bride is the story of two fairly comfortably off people, so same thing there. Even “Punching at the Sun”, though the family is maybe what would be considered lower middle class, and you can see that the parents are tired from working long hours at the convenience store, the store is their own business, which is an accomplishment.

Aside from the authors you mention, have you read Abha Dawesar or Amitava Kumar? I think they reflect a very different reality than some of the authors and filmmaker that you mention.

Let me ask you, which writer or filmmaker do you think has accurately represented Indian-American life?

As for those movies, i cannot comment on their merits, having not seen any of them. I live in Ohio, so we don’t have access to much in the way of independent cinema. Actually I think most of those people made those films to get noticed and hopefully get hired to direct a major Hollywood/Bollywood production, and all that goes with it. Addressing the similar content, they are simply following the Deepa Mehta/Arundhati Roy/Jhumpa Lahiri/Monica Ali/Kiran Desai road to success: ignore the numerous advantages and opportunities you have been given over your peers throughout your life and write a book/movie about how terrible and oppressed you are as a desi woman, especially by those evil, misogynist desi men. Then wait while prize nominations, plaudits and critical praise follow. A pretty smart plan, and us desis are nothing if not quick to adapt to market conditions.

I did make a comment about what has been presented in a lot of Indian and Indian-American films, and that there are some generalities there, though I observe that they are shifting.

I don’t maintain there’s any “movement” against intermarriage, just some observations from friends (Indian-born, US-born of Indian origin, African-born of Indian origin) that some families are less than thrilled at the prospect of someone from outside the community marrying in, but that too, as I mentioned, can be an attitude that changes over the years. My closest friend in the whole world is married to a white American, and her parents love him like their own kid now.

Moreover, I think you yourself are generalizing rather broadly when you say “…There are families that hold tradition very strongly but they are mostly older and outdated and not the rule.” Can you tell me, with such a diverse nation of over 1 billion people (then factor in the numbers of the diaspora on top of that) what is “the rule”? (I don’t think there is one.)

You obviously don’t like Gurinder Chadha or Mira Nair, which is fine, but how about you mention some Indian filmmakers that you do think represent your reality accurately?

Going back to my original comments on the movie “Punching at the Sun”, and the whole bit about the Mom smoking, what I intended to relay is that I found it refreshing to see a film that didn’t cling to the more stereotyped behaviour that IS present in so many films about what a good mother does or doesn’t do, or rather should or shouldn’t do.

And finally, I do take exception when you say “It seems borderline racist to me for you to make all these assumptions on our community based on pop culture references and a couple stifled female friends.” All I’ve been writing about is my observations of what I’ve seen on screen, portrayed by a variety of filmmakers. You can argue as to how relevant pop culture references are or are not, but I would ask you why is it that three of the feature films I saw last week touched on what you and I have been discussing (differences, acceptance, otherness)?

In “Hiding Divya”, a rebellious 32-year-old woman (2nd gen desi) had a daughter out of wedlock 16 years earlier and when she and her mother run into some 1st generation women her mother’s age on Oak Tree Road, they react with shock to the fact that the woman was not married.

In “Nina’s Heavenly Delights”, a young Scottish-Indian woman has a close friend who is also Scottish-Indian and a gay transvestite, and she herself is grappling with accepting that she is a lesbian. Her mother is totally cool about it. In fact everyone is totally cool about it. There are no shocked aunties anywhere.

And in “My Bollywood Bride”, screenplay co-written by Kasmira Shah, who also played the lead role, she frets over choosing and marrying a white American guy (played by Jason Lewis) when her parents have already promised her to - don’t laugh - Gulshan Grover. And when Lewis asks her about never having slept with the man she’s promised to, she replies “That’s not our tradition.” And the overriding message of the film is to follow your heart.

Are any of these accurate representations of Indian or Indian-American reality? Or are the filmmakers hoping to shape and change attitudes by what they portray on screen? I think certainly with “Hiding Divya” and “Nina’s Heavenly Delights” the latter is true. In HD, the stated intent of the filmmaker is to help shed some of the shame associated with a family member having a mental illness, and with NHD, I’m guessing that the director/producer wanted to show a family and community where it wasn’t a big deal to be gay.

And my personal circle of experiences goes way beyond just pop culture references and “a couple of stifled female friends” (and please don’t think cos some cabbie gives out to my BFF or some woman on the street looks at her sideways for smoking that she’s going to be stifled in any way). I’ve spent almost half my life around Indians and Indian-Americans, living side-by-side in one case, and while there are some broad generalities that one can utter, what I’ve learned is that there is no hard rule about anything, and for every rule there are a dozen variety of exceptions and variations. And that’s what makes it fun and fascinating.