East Is East (1999 film)

East Is East
Theatricalrelease poster
Directed by Damien O'Donnell
Produced by Leslee Udwin
Screenplay by Ayub Khan-Din
Starring
Music by Deborah Mollison
Cinematography Brian Tufano
Edited by Michael Parker
Production
company
FilmFour
BBC Films
Assassin Films
Distributed by Channel Four Films (UK)
Miramax Films (US)
Release date
  • 5 November 1999 (1999-11-05)
Running time
 96 minutes
Country United Kingdom
Language English/Urdu-Hindi
Budget £1.9 million[1]
Box office £10 million[2]

East Is East is a 1999 British comedy-drama film written by Ayub Khan-Din and directed by Damien O'Donnell. It is set in Salford, Lancashire, in 1971, in a mixed-ethnicity British household headed by Pakistani father George (Om Puri) and an English mother, Ella (Linda Bassett).

East Is East is based on the play East is East by Ayub Khan-Din, which opened at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre in October 1996 and Royal Court Theatre in November 1996. The title derives from the Rudyard Kipling poem The Ballad of East and West, of which the opening line reads: "Oh East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet".

Plot

George Khan is a Pakistani Muslim who has lived in Britain since 1937. He has a wife in Pakistan. He and his second wife Ella, a British Roman Catholic woman of Irish descent, have been married for twenty-five years and have seven children together; Nazir, Abdul, Tariq, Maneer, Saleem, Meenah and Sajid. George and Ella run a popular fish and chip shop in the neighborhood.

While George is obsessed with the 1971 war between East and West Pakistan and arranging marriages for his children, the children themselves, who were born and brought up in Britain, increasingly see themselves as British and reject Pakistani customs of dress, food, religion and living. After George disowns Nazir for running out on his arranged marriage, he immediately begins making plans to have another one planned to maintain his image.

While on a trip to Bradford, George is introduced to Mr Shah, a fellow Pakistani Muslim who wishes to marry off his two unattractive daughters. George arranges in secret for Abdul and Tariq to marry them, despite Ella's misgivings, a conversation that Sajid overhears. During a sibling quarrel, Sajid reveals the arranged marriage; Tariq, the most rebellious of the sons and who is in a relationship with a local girl, flies into a rage and defiles the wedding garments George had bought. The most obedient son, Maneer, is caught by George trying to tidy the mess up and beaten when he refuses to tell George who was responsible; Ella intervenes and is also beaten. Tariq travels to Eccles and tracks down Nazir, who is in a homosexual relationship and returns to confront George for his actions, but becomes frightened upon seeing Ella and Maneer's bruises and flees. Dejected, Tariq reluctantly agrees to go along with the marriage.

Mr and Mrs Shah arrive with their daughters to meet George's family. Ella maintains her composure despite Mrs Shah's condescending and rude attitude, but things come to a head when a scuffle ensues over a sculpture of a vagina and Saleem accidentally drops it on Mrs Shah's lap. Mrs Shah is angered by this and insults George's entire family, and is subsequently ejected from the house by Ella along with Mr Shah and the daughters. Enraged, George attacks Ella but is stopped by Abdul and the children long enough for him to see how his actions have turned his entire family against him, and leaves the household in shame to seek solace in his shop.

In the aftermath, George and Ella make amends over tea while the kids play in the street.

Cast

International exhibition and responses

US poster obscuring the film's British Pakistani character by featuring a blond woman.

East Is East was remarkably successful for a low-budget comedy (£1.9 million budget), grossing some £10 million in the UK and more than $4.1 million in US cinemas, plus being a big hit across Europe.[3] In addition, when the film was released on video and DVD, it made £12.3 million in UK rentals alone.[4]

Miramax, the film's US distributor, obscured the presence of South Asian characters in the marketing of the film: the poster features the face of a blonde woman, with the Asian characters appearing only in small windows.

In France, the film was called Fish and Chips: la comédie qui croustille! ("Fish and Chips: the crunchy comedy!").[5]

Awards and nominations

The film won the Alexander Korda Award for Best British Film at the BAFTA Awards, and was declared Best Comedy Film at the British Comedy Awards.

The screenwriter, Ayub Khan-Din, won both a British Independent Film Award and a London Critics Circle Film Award for his screenplay. He was also nominated for two BAFTA Awards for Best Adapted Screenplay and the Carl Foreman Award for the Most Promising Newcomer, and for a European Film Award for Best Screenwriter.

The director, Damien O'Donnell, won Best Debut at the UK Empire Awards, won the Evening Standard British Film Awards and Fantasporto for Best Film, won the OCIC Special Award at the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema, won the Kingfisher Award at the Ljubljana International Film Festival, and received a number of nominations, among them a British Independent Film Awards nomination and a David di Donatello Awards nomination.

Sequel

A sequel, West Is West, premiered at the BFI London Film Festival in the autumn of 2010, and was on general UK release from February 2011.

References

  1. ↑ Alexander Walker, Icons in the Fire: The Rise and Fall of Practically Everyone in the British Film Industry 1984– 2000, Orion Books, 2005 p301
  2. ↑ "East is East (2000)". Boxofficemojo.com. Retrieved 30 August 2017.
  3. ↑ Gritten, David (2 April 2000). "A Culture Clash That's Universal". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 18 November 2010.
  4. ↑ "East Is East (1999) – Box office / business". Internet Movie Database. Retrieved 30 August 2017.
  5. ↑ "East is East : Review, Trailer, Teaser, Poster". Cinemagora.co.uk. Retrieved 30 August 2017.
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