It was the year 2005, and my friend father got killed in a heated humiliated ethnic brawl in America plus he was looted of all the hard-earned money, and when his dead body deported to Pakistan, I can't get over the miserable look of his mother, wife, and father.
It's been 15 long years and with life, I forgot about the whole incident but the opening dialogues of this film bring back all the flashbacks.
Released in 2004, "I - Proud to be An Indian" is a story of "I" who is an Indian. He travels to London for a family wedding and finds his family live in fear of the terrorism by National Front Skinheads and finds he has to become involved which escalates the situation.
Written by Sohail Khan, this film is about racism against Asians in London, a sensitive issue that was neglected by the mass media in the previous decades.
Khan covered every aspect of the heinous brawls which normally an Asian has to face towards its ethnic roots.
Direction from Puneet Sira was Okayish, and unlike other Indian directors who love to explore London, he sticks to his story which was a good sign plus the songs were played in narrative style and mostly suited up the story with some great bhangra numbers.
Sohail Khan was the main man, he lived up to it. He got the right attitude from frame A to Z. He was masculine, expressive, and badass with equally good action choreography. It was looking like a tale from the 1980s Hollywood cinema. Sohail was paralleled by his supporting cast especially Kulbushan Kharbanda & Asif Sheikh.
Last Word: "I - Proud to be an Indian" is a film with great potential, a good entertainer, with a minimal budget. It was an experiment to deviate from usual Hindi films which never paid off, but I loved its theme and message.
I learned a lot of things, and one of them is your "dignity" and the other is "self-respect" and in real life, we easily compromise on these things and let the evil sail through victory.
Recommended to Actioners, who want to have some different flare.
