Movie Review : The Bong Connection

[I actually saw this film yesterday, first-day-first-show, it just took me this long to get myself to admit it.]

[You probably won't see this film. Everybody you know will also not see this film. And not only did I spend money to see two hours of Cliches-dressed-as-real-characters, I am wasting hours of my life writing about it. Sigh.]

The Bong Connection is a film made by Bongs (Apparently it's not as offensive as I thought, but what do I know) for Bongs (A lot of Bongali, and a lot of tame subtitles) about Bongs - two in particular - Andy and Apu (That's right a so-obvious-I-don't-know-why-I'm-mentioning-it Satyajit Ray reference; let's watch how they mess it up), Andy and Apu, both leave home for a foreign country (Kolkata for Andy and Amrica for Apu) to follow their dreams, get disillusioned subsequently and return home, each a little wiser ["I think I've seen this movie before!" "Sitdown and shaddap!"] For lack of a better label I'd say it's a Coming of Age film - both protagonists get their dreams shattered, have unrequited love affairs, and have a close friend die unexpectedly ["I HAVE se-" "I said QUIET!"] The film takes itself very seriously though, and, even with it's inconsistencies (and casual name-dropping), it's main theme is Narrow-mindedness, whether intentionally or not, I don't know (As seen with Andy's Uncle, the stereotypically middle-class Babu; Apu's Boss, the Bigot, and instances among others; and the general hinting of Real Bongs vs. Sellouts throughout the film.)


But I could go on for hours about the Plot (as I have on earlier drafts), lets get down to the dirty.


The Acting is passable. The bad (Bad) dub job makes it seem worse than it is, and the director is also accountable, but mediocre talent shines through. Parambrata Chattopadhyay gives a good performance though, as fed-up-with-India-Amrica-is-better Apu ["I really hav-" "Why you little ..." gakk], and an even better performance as an Inscrutable, Drunk Apu in Amrica.

Another memorable character is Haas, the street-wise illegal Bangladeshi immigrant, who, in barely 15 minutes of screen time, tries really, really hard to give his character depth, motive and plausibility. The key word being tries really hard. Some dialogue samples from Haas -
#1 - [Staring down barrel of gun] "Wanna shoot me man? You wanna shoot me?! Go Ahead! I ain't got nothing to live for here. Nothing!"
"That's my wife you're sleeping with"
[Takes gun] "You lost the right to call her that the day you broke her nose you Sonofabitch!" pistolwhip!
#2 - "You and me baby, we gonna live in a big house by the sea. Yup, just you, me and my [previously unmentioned] little girl. And you're not gonna strip anymore either. And we gonna have a little baby too. Those are all my hopes and dreams. I just hope nothing goes wrong, like Immigration catching up with me."
#3 - [Immediately after #2] "Please don't take me in officer! You a family man too! You got kids! I can't go to jail now! My little girl needs me to support her! I was gonna go back, I swear! Look, here's her pic-"
"Look he's running away. Let's shoot at him fellow expressionless police officer."
Bang! erkk! [Slow Motion fall into river. Bloody picture of little girl floats away.]


Other actors give better performances than Haas (Tough job, but they managed it). Victor Banerjee as Apu's bigoted boss was good, except perhaps he was confused which side of the Atlantic his accent was supposed to be from. But his character was really ruined when towards the end, just when you're really starting to hate his capitalistic-bigoted guts, he comes up with the parting line "Aparjito, the Unvanquished" and looks at him with what I gathered was a "Admired Foe Leaving Battlefield" smile (after Apu has just acted like a whiny little Holden). Peeya Rai Choudhary and Raima Sen also make an appearance, but were quite unemarkable.
Hence the lack of, uh, you get the picture.

Direction could have been much better; as could the sound and the editing; inconsistency in style being the main complaint. The director often places the camera behind the actors, but I suppose that was to hide the shoddy dub work. Editing was jumpy in some places (to save time? I don't know) and did I mention the Dubbing?
Soundtrack seemed to be showcasing Bongla Fusion music (Bongla Lyrics + Rock Ballad arrangement = Fusion? Is that all there is to it?) and seemed to come and go as it pleases. It sort of wises up towards the end and starts showing up more so they would still have to pay for it.


All things considered, this film isn't worth two hours of your time. It's nothing new (no matter what it may appear to be), unless you want to see Piya Rai Choudhary do an american accent. The film is probably just another one in the wave Pop-Art Films that seem to be hitting multiplexes (That's the excuse they give.) It tries to hard to be relevant and deep, but to me, it seemed cheesy and familiar. But hey, on the bright side, I seem to be the only one who's seen this film, so I guess it doesn't matter.

I guess this whole post doesn't matter.
Hmm.