Wednesday, March 24, 2010

If You See Just One Movie This Year, Make It This Horrendous Piece of Bollywood Crap, "My Name is Khan"

Julie and I saw our first Bollywood flick 6 weeks ago, but are still fascinated by how this 3.5 hour behemoth was written, funded, produced, and screened.

Shah Rukh Khan stars as Rizwan Khan, a middle-class Indian Muslim with Asperger's Syndrome who moves in with his San Francisco-based brother after the death of his mother. He falls in love with a local hairdresser and they marry, but the terrorist attacks of September 11th inspire suspicion and hate crimes against his family. When his 14 year-old step son is murdered by a racist, after-school soccer team, Rizwan's wife has a breakdown and orders him to leave the house on a mission: Find the President of the United States and tell him: "My name is Khan, and I am not a terrorist!"

But Khan's efforts to reach the president run into trouble at a George W. Bush support rally in San Francisco, when security hear him yelling "Terrorist!" (as in, "I am not a terrorist!"). They arrest him and bring him to a Guantanamo-like facility, where he is tortured and interrogated. A federal judge releases him when it's discovered that rather than being a terrorist, Khan had actually reported the plot of a radical imam to the FBI.

Free from prison, Khan journeys to Georgia, where he saves the town of Willamina from a Hurricane Katrina-type storm, inspiring other American Muslims to assert their identities and perform acts of community service. Unfortunately, while reconciling with his wife while constructing a makeshift hospital, Khan is stabbed by the very imam he had reported to the FBI!

Meanwhile, Barack Obama is elected President on a pro-Georgia Reconstruction platform, and at his first speech as president-elect, invites Rizwan--just out of the hospital--to share the podium with him, and Khan finally has his chance to tell the American government: "My name is Khan, and I am not a terrorist."

You can watch the trailer here.

Mark and Juliah

2 comments:

  1. I've got to see this.

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  2. We saw our first Bollywood flick in HI and couldn't believe our friends were enjoying it. We walked out half way through the movie. We couldn't agree with you more on how these movies make it into the theaters. Enjoy your travels! Ron and Diana F.

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