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| Seeing
Red, Showing Pink |
By
Zahra Meherali |
| This one is personal
for director Ian Iqbal Rashid. |
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He
may have titled his film Touch of Pink,
but writer/director Ian Iqbal Rashid was
really seeing red.
He admits: "Making this film is an
affectionate form of revenge against all
I had to put up with in my own family. Choosing
to be a filmmaker went so against the immigrant
dream my family had adopted of me becoming
a doctor or dentist or some sort of professional.
When I told them, I felt like I had just
announced that I was going to become a baby-killer,
or something. These immigrant values are
reflected in the South Asian community in
this film."
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He points to the pressure
on Alim, the film's main character, to
do the right thing by becoming successful
in conventional terms. "Alim can
only escape this pressure by putting an
ocean between him and his family. Yet
as the film progresses, he realizes that
by running away, he has also rejected
a big part of who he is."
Touch of Pink, Rashid's first feature
film , icenters around a muslim South
Asian Canadian, Alim, who lives in London
estranged from his family until the upcoming
wedding of his Canadian cousin forces
him to reconnect with widowed mother,
Nuru and in doing so, accept his culture
and heritage. |
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Jimi Mistry as Alim (left),
Sulekha Mathew as Nuru (Center)
and Kristen Holden-Reis as Giles
(right) in Touch of Pink.
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Nuru dreams
of having Alim return to Toronto and settle
down with a proper Muslim bride and has
no idea that Alim is in fact in two releationships
- one with his boyfriend Giles and the
other with his imaginary personal mentor,
the spirit of Cary Grant, a manifestation
of his love for old Hollywood movies and
his need for a father figure.
Cue in the traditional comedy of errors
where Alim tries to come out of the proverbial
closet despite the haphazard advice of
his version of Cary Grant and add in the
poignant drama of his attempt to reclaim
his true identity.
For Rashid, an Indian Ismaili Muslim,
who was born in Dar-e-Salaam, moved to
Toronto when he was 6, then on to London
in his early 20s, where he lives now,
the movie "was very autobiographical"
with the exception of the spirit of Cary
Grant who he is quite sure is not with
him.
"It's based on my life and my relationship
with my mother and my love of old Hollywood
films. So all the material in the film
is sourced from my own life. I guess I
just wanted to tell an old fashioned Hollywood
style movie, but with someone like me
in the center".
Rashid entered the television industry
12 years ago to critical acclaim by writing
scripts for British TV series, including
the award winning show "This Life."
His introduction to the film media started
four years ago when he wrote and directed
two award winning short films "Surviving
Sabu," a story about a young South
Asian man and his father documenting the
life of desi film star Sabu and "Stag,"
the story of a South Asian man's pre-wedding
night experiences.
From Rashid's choice of themes in his
film career so far, he seems to have a
lot to say about his South Asian heritage.
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He explains, "For a
lot of South Asians living in the west who
experience a dominant culture and particularly
as it's kind of filtering through Hollywood
and television, I think often, even without
being conscious of it, we have a sort of
inferiority complex; even a level of self-hating."
"There's a tight-rope walk between
assimilating into Western culture, and yet
keeping a sense of who you are. The process
of assimilation can erase aspects of identity,
both cultural and personal, which are special
and unique. Yet, it's very seductive to
become part of a dominant culture, to belong
to the home team - and Touch of Pink is
about that as well."
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Ian Iqbal Rashid with Sulekha
Mathew on the set of Touch of Pink.
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In addition
to the east meets west theme, Rashid also
addressed two lifestyle choices, which are
traditionally thought of as unconventional
for South Asians - in particular, his career
in the entertainment industry and his homosexuality.
In the film, Rashid also attempts to show
Hollywood's influence on the South Asian
communities in the East. Nuru, Alim's mother,
grew up watching old, often outdated, Hollywood
movies and fantasizing about moving to the
west with its promises of glamour and freedom.
Her disillusionment when she eventually
moved and was able to see the western society
as it really was may have led to her rejection
of films and all things Hollywood.
On the issue of homosexuality, Rashid explains
that "There is so much hypocrisy on
this subject and a lot of suffering, because
there are a lot of ... gay men and lesbians
who are getting married and having children.
A lot of lives are being impacted. They
are leading double lives and it's very painful.
And rather than sweep it under the rug its
time to kind of address it. Years ago when
I was in Toronto I set up a gay men's group
when I was in university called Khush and
we invited South Asian gay men to come.
Our first meeting we had 50 people arrive
... It's there, it's an issue. So I have
had lots of young South Asian gay men come
up to me in tears because they are so grateful
for this film and they want to bring their
parents to it when it comes out and try
and set up a kind of dialogue and kind of
open the door to talking to their families
about what their lives are about."
One Muslim man touched Rashid in particular
when he admitted, "I've never told
anyone this before but I have lived my whole
life as a straight man. I've married, I
have grown up children, my wife just died."
According to Rashid "It's the first
time he's seen something that spoke to him
and gave him hope so I feel already with
those responses that I've won."
While Rashid is trying to come to terms
with his South Asian identity and personal
life choices, Jimi Mistry, who plays the
lead character, on the other hand, seems
to consider himself mainly as British.
He clarifies: "That's kinda where I
was born and raised and whatever my cultural
background is. My father's Indian and my
mother is Anglo-Irish. I have that as part
of my life and its very much part of my
background, but my identity is British."
He has admitted in past interviews to Michael
Jackson and John Travolta being his inspirations
growing up.
Unlike Rashid, Mistry came into his career
aspirations later in life and his family
was instrumental in his choice.
He admits, "If it wasn't for my dad
I wouldn't have been acting. He is the one
that steered me into this career. When I
was 17, I didn't have a clue what I wanted
to do. I wasn't doing particularly well
in school. I wasn't excelling in academic
subjects. I was a bit of a drifter.
"I was a little dreamy ... liked music
and singing and going down to the pub and
playing pool and I was just a bit of a normal,
everyday boy... My dad's a doctor and he
sat me down when I was 17 and said Jimmy
what are you going to do, because you are
not going in any direction here? And I said
I don't know what I want to do. And he said
you better go upstairs and write a list
of the things you want to do with your life
and the things you think you are good at
and bad at and come downstairs and we're
going to match. We're going to do this pragmatically
and we're going to come up with something.
I said fine... I had done a school play
and it kind of came down to acting and he
said he believed that this may be the direction;
I went to acting school".
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Mistry says, "The
first time I realized that I was a part
of a minority was when I got into this
business. Up until then it never really
occurred to me... People like to bracket
you in certain areas and I refuse to be
bracketed.
Over the years I have managed to play
interesting, good, really good South Asian
characters, but I have also managed to
play characters of no specific background,
which as an actor is a major barrier to
break. It doesn't get any easier at all,
but things do start to happen if you keep
believing in what you are doing."
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Kristen Holden-Reis as
Giles (left) and Jimi Mistry as
Alim (center) in Touch of Pink.
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Mistry
credits his success to his belief in his
own abilities and his stubborn refusal
"to play the small minority parts,
even though that may be the only option
when you are starting out in your career
with a South Asian background.
Although he claims he "will at some
point," Mistry has not yet learned
Hindi. "I'm going to do it; it's
just having the time and the commitment
to do it. Learning Hindi would be taking
a risk... I think that to be honest the
time that I will have to is the time when
I would have to for a film or something
and then I would get my head around it
very quickly."
Do we hear a touch for Bollywood in that?
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