East Is East (1999)

A Comedy?
While this film doubtlessly gives realistic insight into the culture shock of a traditional Pakistani man struggling to maintain the customs of his homeland in 1970's England---and to force those same customs onto his assimilating family---what I can't understand is how so many people found this movie to be both heartwarming and comedic. At least that's the billing it got when it was recommended to me by friends, and also how I heard it touted years ago by Terry Gross on NPR's Fresh Air. The main character here, George Khan, played by India's prolific Om Puri, is among the least sympathetic figures in all of recent cinema, which would be fine if the feeling was he was being set up to be presented that way, but the impression I got was that we were meant to receive him as more of a misguided soul than an abusive tyrant. He beats his wife, alienates his children by among other things seeking to force arranged marriages onto them, is a bigamist (of sorts) and a total bigot who thinks all Indians are evil and out to get him and other Pakistanis, yet the situations and clues in the background music seem determined to dismiss his antics as humorous. So spousal abuse and overseer-like control of children is funny, then, is it? As I watched this film, all I could think of was good riddance to Mr. Khan's traditions and customs, and long live the tolerance we have here in the west. I found the lives of his children, especially his hairdresser son and English-born wife, to be much more interesting than the self-torturing Khan. East Is East has merit but that comes as a study of cultures in a time and place not long past rather than from its central character, George Khan. Its classification as a comedy puzzles me.

IUC - Indian Urination Camp
This movie is an IUC (Indian Urination Camp), there is nothing Pakistani in this movie, all the cast which is palying charachters mentioned as Pakistanis are being played by Indian actors. I am 100% sure that the director, producer and writer of this movie never visited Pakistan and neither they studied a Pakistani family very closely before making this movie. This movie is a perfect example of an Indian product having Pakistani label on it. In other words, they labelled it Pakistani but every thing in it is Indian. When ever they want to show bad side of Indian culture or some thing insulting about it, they label it as Pakistani.

In simple terms, this movie is disgusting and if you really want to watch a bunch of Indians urinating all over the place and you have enough money to waste to see people urinating then you should purchase this movie.

"Indian Urination Camp" would have been a more suitable title for this movie instead of "east is east".

Compelling Storytelling
With a rare combination of edge, grit, song and dance, heart, obscenity, and hilarity, the director takes this stage play and turns it into an unrelenting examination of the explosive tensions involved in a Pakistani family's assimilation into British society. The performances are all remarkable, and you won't mistake this for something you've seen before even though it has elements of "Bend It Like Beckham."