ABCD | Film Review | Slant Magazine

FILM MOVIE REVIEW

ABCD **

by Ed Gonzalez on November 26, 2001 Jump to Comments (0) or Add Your Own

Buy on Amazon:

Video

I'm sure it's possible to make an Indian-themed film without referencing chutney but you'd never know it by watching Krutin Patel's well-meaning but amateurish ABCD. Nina (a shrill Sheetal Sheth) is an American Born Confused Desi, a rebellious lover of white men. Brother Raj (Faran Tahir) doesn't disappoint though it's not long before he and Nina do the skin-color-lover switcheroo. The dorky new-to-America Ashok (Aasif Mandvi) introduces Nina to the joy of Indian love while Raj finds himself attracted to coworker Julia (Jennifer Dorr White) when his traditionalist wife begins to cramp his style. Raj is Patel's most three-dimensional character, a man none too obsessed with tradition though thrown for a loop when faced with the notion that love can indeed exist within the arms of a white woman. Less successful is Patel's contemptuous characterization of Nina as hopelessly out-of-touch with her inner-Desi; she may earn her bitch label but Patel seems to suggest that any girl who strays too far from India is a lost cause. Ashok lovingly reads her an eye-rolling fairy tale that coincidentally complements her dating dilemma ("the duke was not meant for her") yet she still chooses vanilla when she goes back to ex-flame Sam (Rex Young), a yuppie with a yacht. Patel's visual palette seems blandly at odds with all the egregious (ab)use of cultural-marker foods while all the identity posturing is just that. Much like the fortuneteller mother Anju (Madhur Jaffrey) brings in from Jersey City to read Nina's fortune, ABCD dishes out answers like a Magic 8-Ball.

Director(s): Krutin Patel
Screenplay: James McManus, Krutin Patel
Cast: Madhur Jaffrey, Faran Tahir, Sheetal Sheth, Aasif Mandvi, David Ari, Jennifer Dorr White, Adriane Forlana Erdos, Rex Young, Gil Grail
Distributor: Eros Entertainment
Runtime: 105 min.
Rating: NR
Year: 1999