By Sailesh Ram
FUN, funny, and quite funky. Yeah, man, what youuu waiting for – get down to ya local now and catch Delhi Belly. Not literally, of course.
The Aamir Khan produced comedy premiered on June 30 night at the London Indian Film Festival and was in most part rapturously received and not simply because Abhinay Deo, the director, was among the audience and opened himself to questions afterwards.
There’s little doubt that this film breaks ground for Indian and Bollywood cinema particularly, in a number of very positive and appealing ways, especially for a Western-orientated audience.
First, the film is almost all in English – there are a few Hindi scenes – but you can get by without having subtitles for these (“technical difficulties, Deo opined), and after the initial strangeness it seems natural and works. And Deo captures the energy of this lingo well.
After all this is how urban youths in India speak, especially the ones who are well-educated and somewhat overly influenced by US drama and its youth mores.
Secondly, it shows a side of India we know is there but is rarely exposed in Bollywood movies – there is swearing, smoking (a bit too much for anyone, really), and some very blunt references to pre-marital sex and the like (you know where I am heading…). All that is good to a point and works for a cinema public in London that is used to far worse (Porky's, Animal House, etc).
How it will fare in India, I am not sure. It could well be a hit and something of a cult classic for the young – because it does seem to capture the mood of the moment for anyone in and under 25 in urban India. Outside of that demographic, who knows how it will play. It might be a little too crude and taboo-breaking (or should that be wind-breaking).
Yes, the Delhi Belly of the title is indeed a reference to matters excremental and forms the core of the rather predictable “swap” plot; diamonds for stools…
Despite this, there are some neat performances and, again, rather groundbreakingly, they are natural and clever talents at work. No Bollywood histrionics that passes for "acting".
Tashi (Imran Khan) is the all too loveable idealistic young man caught in set of bad circumstances but the film wrings far more from his sidekicks Nitin (Kunal Roy Kapur), Arup (Vir Das), and the lesser (in screen time only) women characters (Poorna Jagannathan) and Shenaz Treasury.
There are some genuinely laugh-out loud moments and the whole affair has a generous and entertaining tone.
Unfortunately, the ending is too drawn out and the Aamir Khan item number (dance sequence) at the end is pointless and annoying (the one dance sequence in the movie was thankfully short but amusing).
Deo was asked what might Bollywood look like in five years; if his film is anything to go by, it should be emerging from the shadows and stepping into rather more glorious global sunlight.
The London Indian Film Festival continues until July 12.
