Madrid ‘Masala’
Bollywood is hugely popular in Spain, while in cities like Barcelona, the few desi immigrants I met were usually Punjabi street vendors and tapas cooks. Masala (2007), Salvador Calvo’s tale of a poor immigrant high school in Spain, has a Sikhni character wearing a dupatta sing a Hindi song at 21:30:
In the preceding dialogue, she explains wet sari scenes:
|
Teacher: [Shuts off opera song] Pria, que crees que pasa? Pria: Sufre para amor… Teacher: ¿Y cómo lo sabes? Pria: Porque en las pelÃÂculas Indias, cuando una mujer sufre para amor, canta asÅ Pero aquàhay muchos besos y bueno, de eso [el sexo]… Teacher: ¿Pero en las pelÃÂculas Indias, no hay besos? Pria: No, jamás. Pero sàabrazos, y llueve mucho… Pues, que cuando llueve, la ropa de las chicas se le espega mucho al cuerpo. [Ooo] Y eso a los hombres les gusta. Teacher: ¿Y tu sabrÃÂa cantarnos como cantan las mujeres Indias…? Student: … Lo que pasa es que su papá no le deja. |
Teacher: [Shuts off opera song] Pria, what do you think happens? Pria: She suffers for love… Teacher: And how do you know that? Pria: Because in Indian films, when a woman suffers for love, she sings like this. But there are lots of kisses and, well, this stuff [sex] here… Teacher: But in Indian films, there aren’t kisses? Pria: No, never. But hugs are ok, and it rains a lot. Well, when it rains, girls’ clothing sticks a lot to their bodies. And the men like this. Teacher: And would you know how to sing to us like Indian women sing? Student: … What’s going on is that her dad doesn’t let her. |
Here’s a synopsis from a NYC Latino film fest in July:
Antonio is the principal of a high school in a troubled immigrant neighborhood, fighting to prevent his school’s closing and the scattering of his students. Judith is the new music teacher, struggling to unite the students through a common project.
Among the students are Pria, a Sikh girl whose family already wants to marry her off; Yassin, a troubled Moroccan boy; Oswaldo, an Ecuadoran caught in the spell of his older gang-member brother; Rai, a disabled Gypsy; Lucrecia, an aspiring actress from the Caribbean; the tough-talking Bea; and Wang, a Chinese boy who is good-naturedly flunking through school. [Link]
on Thursday, August 23rd, 2007, 5:20 pm in Film, Video clips › 
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Aww… um.. not quite.
well it seems to be a case of getting the quiet kid to finally be accepted - and she does it by singing a melody that noone understands but everyone says, “wow! the marionette can dance. she is an entertainer worthy of our attention.”
Reminds me of a trudeau era public services message in which these kids are tormenting the indian kid who wears a big ass turban. They are all at the lake where people are skating. The ice breaks and a kid falls in. The indian kid unravels his big pug and throws it to the drowning kid. All the kids pull on and save the sinking loser. I’m sure it’s on youtube somewhere.
but yea. two points for effort.
Did you venture to Maldakistan while in Barcelona?
They had a ShahRukh Khan double feature playing when I was there, and true to form whistles, cat-calls and applause from the audience peppered the surround sound movie dialogues.
Trust me on this….latinos like Bollywood movie songs like anything here at CA…