The blue dress
The President is Coming opens in India on Nov. 28th, and it’s one of the rare cases where a play benefits from the transition to film. As funny as the play was, there were some lulls in its second half. The film version is sharper and tighter. My buddy Anuvab Pal, the playwright and screenwriter, and director Kunaal Roy Kapoor changed the Godot-like ending, dropping surrealist cred in favor of a dick joke and a proper send-off for the outgoing Dunce-in-Chief.
A couple of stage actors lost their roles to more famous actors in the film version, but Konkona Sen and Shernaz Patel are far more experienced actors. Ira Dubey plays the female lead, sounding like carbon copy of her raspy-voiced mom Lillete (Monsoon Wedding). President’s stellar comedic ensemble carries the movie. It’s as if the filmmakers rounded up all the good young character actors in Bombay. This flick may birth the future Vinay Pathaks and Boman Iranis. Goldspot rocks the custom Hinglish score.
The movie displays Pal’s trademarks: contests, lesbians and contesting lesbians. The competition is an effective creative device because it moves the plot along and is guaranteed to blow its dramatic wad at the end. But the battle-of-the-bands climax has weaknesses. Like Slumdog Millionaire, President runs a bit long with numbered rounds of competition. Episodic formats work best when the number of episodes is in the single digits. I wasn’t a big fan of the animated interludes as a result.
President is one of the first Dubya films out the gate; think of it as the surrealist twin to studio movies like W. Kapoor, Pal and Loins director Manish Acharya are attempting something else quite fascinating: mass-market Indian English comedy which relies more on wordplay (and yes, dick jokes) than crude David Dhawan slapstick. Think mass-market Stoppard. Like Manorama, it isn’t immediately obvious whether the niche exists at a national scale; but if it does, these are the guys to uncover it.
The trailer is above. Here’s the extended version:
The actors and filmmakers goof around like divas:
on Thursday, November 20th, 2008, 9:59 pm in Film, Video clips › 
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I want a T-shirt with the screen cap of the first video you’ve posted.
Nicolette Sheridan is 1/8 Punjabi, Tatyana Ali is half-Indian, Rihanna is a quarter Indian and Cliff Richard is also of Indian descent… you have to make a post about this!
thanks Manish, I always wondered what this movie president is coming is all about..thanks for video link..it looks very interesting..who knew someone would make an interesting movie on presidents bushs trip to India..very creative unique idea..I will be in India in a week, hope it is playing in hyderabad in main theatres to watch. thanks for the videos..wish u all happy holidays and a very happy new year. have fun.
The set-up sounds very intriguing, but if the movie is standard Bush-bashing fare, I’ll think I’ll pass. What will some of the most creative artists in the world do without Bush to kick around? Think up fresh ideas?
Okay, good luck to your friends and I hope they are very successful but I had to stop the extended trailer half-way through.
Why does every actress look like the same these days, India or America? I swear, if I see one more long haired-straightened, eye-brow plucked-into-oblivion stick, I’ll scream. It’s as bad as the concave-chested hipster male as sex symbol. Enough already!
I know, poor, misunderstood, Bush. And to add insult to injury, he’s going to sweep the bottom of the barrel of history too - probably competing with Buchanan as worst president ever, first with his actions causing untold damage, and now, in the financial crisis, his inaction, due to being wrapped into a ball in fetal position, causing untold damage.
whatever boohoo, that wasn’t my point. Seriously, the democrats have been in a majority in Congress for the past two years and none of the financial crisis can be laid at careerists in Washington, of both parties, or Wall Street, it’s only Bush? That’s my point. Much of the criticism in the artistic community has been childish, vapid and, frankly, stupid. It reminds me of the eighties and Reagan/Thatcher criticism. Some of it was principled, much of it was fashion.
Majority in half a bicameral. Not filibuster-proof.