There isn’t really a good or bad reason to review a film about Nanarland. In general we do it because it’s a beautiful thing and we want to talk about it, to make people discover it, to share the excitement and pleasure of discovery.
But sometimes, like here, we do it to keep track. Faced with a film that’s not so funny but particularly curious, embarrassing, improbable or all of that at the same time, we feel the need to talk about it, if only to move on to something else. We also say that, to a certain extent, if Nanarland doesn’t talk about it, then who will?
Let’s see the object first New Delirium from the outside. The cover sounds like a challenge: “A Bollywood film hijacked by Eric le Roch“, she proclaims as if there was something to be proud of, before highlighting the most WTF vocal casting on this side of the Gates of the Sun.
While we are still processing the upper half of the image, the shield at the bottom left falls into view: “Pierre and Marie Curry loved it!” he boasts to finish us off. A graphic creation touching on the sublime, promising a work capable of reaching the highest peaks of the Cordillera of Malaise by combining double-minded racism and uninhibited humor. Or the opposite. We don’t hasn’t even started the film and we already find ourselves on the defensive.
We’re not ready. We just know that it’s going to be expensive.
New Delirium is therefore not an ordinary film: it is a humorous diversion in the tradition of Can dialectics break bricks Or American class. This is a reassembly and reduplication of Saajan Chale Sasurala romantic comedy released in India in 1996 directed by David Dhawan and starring Govinda, Karisma Kapoor and Tabu.
The film enjoyed great public success in India upon its release, but is not particularly notable when seen in France. The choice of Saajan Chale Sasural as a basis for diversion is also a first cause for astonishment considering that Indian cinema regularly produces much more guignolesque films, which would have been more open to parody.
Saajan Chale Sasural tells the romance between Shyamsundar Gupta (played by Govinda in the original version, renamed Bobby and dubbed by Pascal Légitimus in New Delirium), young peasant singer with a golden voice gone to try his luck in the city, and Divya Khurana (played by Tabu in original version, renamed Fanny and dubbed by Mathilda May in New Delirium), daughter of the biggest music producer in the country (Jean-Marie Bigard). Their marriage is thwarted when Shyamsundar learns that his first wife (Karisma Kapoor / Paula in VF / Hélène de Fougerolles) whom he thought was dead is alive and well and he therefore accidentally finds himself a bigamist. Gags and misunderstandings follow one another when the hunk tries to manage his two marriages and his budding career, while becoming the target of a formidable group of Bad Guys™.
Vervet voice-over: “A taste-of-puppy dress… Afflemou glasses… Unsold items from the Trois Cuisses catalog”.
“You, with your stripes on your forehead, you can still be a sponsor for Adidas!” Haha! Ha. Ha. Argh.
“Machin”, Bobby’s sidekick, is dubbed by Luis Rego in French. The guy with the horned helmet is a joke inlay that we didn’t understand.
New Delirium broadly repeats the plot of the original film, adding lame jokes, “funny” sound effects and visual gags inserted more or less randomly into the image. The editing is also shorter, 1h25 where the original according to IMDB was 2h15 – quite frankly it’s not worse, I’m not sure that we would have endured three-quarters of an hour more without risking both the rupture of aneurysm and those of diplomatic relations.
As always with comedies that cram in 10 gags per minute, there are a handful that work: a running gag of Pascal Légitimus exclaiming “You will not have my freedom of thought!” every time Bobby gets beaten up in fights, the credits of Fort Boyard which is launched during a stunt scene, or this line when Bobby comes to free his imprisoned sweethearts: “I’m going to untie you, do you have any K2R?!” made us laugh to the core. That’s all, yes that’s three. [NDLR : Et encore Barracuda est le seul ici à avoir ri à la blague du K2R] [Note de Barracuda : J’assume.]
See, here, if they had just written “José Bové”, it would make one joke, but by writing “José Beauvais”, it makes TWO jokes in one shot! That’s the power of French humor!
A word on the visual inserts, which are both the main originality of the film in relation to its models of diversions, and the source of the most distressing jokes. A word I said, or rather, a series of headings because words fail us.
Mouhahaha the “Ugly old women competition” at “Pek’Noz”!!!!!!!
This film is a real rework… Mahal! You have it ? Mahal reassembly!
There is also a recurring gag that we didn’t understand, with the insertion of a guy playing golf in the background of around ten scenes.
If New Delirium fails as a comedy it’s because it’s not very funny, and if it fails as a comedy it’s because it’s never very surprising. What do we say to ourselves when we see the cover and read the summary? That the whole project will be unbearably condescending towards Indian cinema, that the jokes will be appalling and that the only unknown is whether it will be a little racist, moderately racist or very racist. And this is exactly what is confirmed upon viewing. The very first line of the film sees Bobby complaining “Romanians who invaded the metro trains“. The joke about “Pierre and Marie Curry” is recycled three times in the film. Perhaps the only thing that we hadn’t come here are the “tarlouzes”, “fags” and other “fags” sprinkled generously throughout the film, released as we recall in 2007.
When you have a good valve, you don’t let it slip away like that!
And the end.
We postponed this moment as long as we could, but we need to talk to you about the ending.
We are just before the final singing sequence. While Bobby must choose between his two sweethearts, Pascal Légitimus and Eric Le Roch interrupt the film and appear in front of the camera. They invite (fictitiously, in fact it’s a mini-sketch) the viewer to vote by SMS to decide which of the two wives will become legitimate and which will reactivate their Meetic account. And they do it…disguised as “Indians”. With the traditional Hindu red dot on the forehead. In full brown face.
Providing a definitive answer to the question of the exact level of racism in the film.
Punctuated with jokes about football, gastro, Limoges and Thierry Ardisson, the sequence is not funny, nor is it corny strictly speaking, but it certainly provokes a feeling of embarrassment of an intensity rarely experienced elsewhere . In addition it is interminable (3 minutes in real time, 3 hours hiding your eyes behind your fingers in real time).
*Sigh…*
We return to the source of this chronicle of New Delirium : this kind of filmic slippage as uncontrolled as it is improbable, this stunt that should never have been attempted, this moment of cinema that you take like an atemi to the throat and which leaves you panting with shame in your chair… yes we don’t talk about it on Nanarland, who will?
At least they seemed to have fun doing it…
