Cinema World Tour, Film #3
Country: UK
Watched in: Manali, Himachal Pradesh, India
Rating: 7/10
I've obviously seen a lot of stuff from the UK. So for the Cinema World Tour, I wanted to see something truly british, a film with some kind of cult status in british households. Something in a small british town, about a topic which isn't atypical for the UK. East is East is such a film.
East is East's story is rather simple: It's about the Pakistani George Khan, married to a british woman, who raises his children in a small town in England. Khan - fantastic in the role: Om Puri – is extremely conservative and raises his children the same way: forced marriage, circumcision, many strict rules, etc. His children, on the other hand, get more and more influenced by the british way of thinking and disagree with their fathers plans for them.
I think East is East is a good film. Definitely not what I expected: it might be intended to be a comedy, but the comedic parts get more and more replaced by scaring, chilling scenes, as the Pakistani father gets more and more violent.
Today, a film like this wouldn't be made anymore, especially due to our political correctness culture which often forbids us to simply tell the truth. Nowadays, a film like East is East would be called racist. Is it really? For sure, the portrayal of the Pakistani community is very stereotypical and one-dimensional. It would have been good if there would be another Pakistani character written into the film, same age as George Khan, who is much more liberal than him, just to show that not everyone is the same way as Khan.
But apart from that, I wouldn't say East is East is racist, because what is portrayed here - domestic violence, child indoctrination, surpession of liberty, fundamentalist to fascist values etc. - is the truth. Things like this do happen, even in 2020, in many households (by far not all). And the Pakistani community, also their religion, Islam, can easily be replaced by any other community. Whether it's a ultra conservative christian familiy indoctrinating their children with fear in the USA, whether it's a Hindu family who marries their children to a stranger, whether it's a Nazi family in Germany who teaches their children that refugees should stay in their country. Any of these examples is deeply wrong, and there are also many films about these.
East is East's message isn't that Pakistanis are always conservative and bad. The film is simply showing an example of child abuse, which is completely regardless from religious orientation, origin and social status a major crime, which would put George Khan into prison.
The film also portrays the children of Khan as very liberal – one is homosexual, one is a practicing Muslim, one an artist: it shows them as completely normal young men and women. The only „bad“ character in the film is Khan, who is influenced by social pressure. So calling this film racist would be absolutely stupid: only one Pakistani character is portrayed as conservative, the others are all perfectly integrated.
East is East is definitely not politically correct, but necessary. It's important to raise awareness for these cases of domestic violence, and if you get to know about one, you have to speak up. It doesn't matter at all if the family, in which these incidents happen, is Muslim, Christian or whatever. Domestic violence and child abuse are not „normal“ in any culture, it's always, without any exception, wrong.
Another point I like about this film is that it shows the emancipatory journey of the children: how they free themselves from their father's abuse, how they learn to speak up for themselves. It's often an uncomfortable watch, the film will make you angry, but leave you satisfied and somehow thoughtful in the end.
East is East should be seen as an inspiration to make more films like these today. We mustn't be afraid to touch topics which are nowadays labelled as „politically incorrect“, if that means that we stay silent about serious problems which could just happen in the neighbours home.
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