Bollywood/Hollywood has been spotted at, or near, the top of many lists this past fall – from the Toronto International Film Festival, at which it opened the Perspective Canada program; to its impressive opening weekend, besting the per screen average of Men with Brooms at $8,700; to, most recently, five Genie nominations, placing it in the upper ranks of multiple-nominated films such as Ararat, Spider and Savage Messiah.

The musical comedy by Toronto-based filmmaker Deepa Mehta (Fire, Earth) is in the running for best picture, along with a nom for best screenplay and another three for supporting performances for Moushumi Chaterjee, Ranjit Chowdry and Dina Pathak.

‘We’ve been extremely fortunate,’ says producer David Hamilton, via e-mail, from the CineAsia trade show in Thailand, where he picked up the Director of the Year award on Mehta’s behalf on Dec 3. ‘[We had] a lot of support from everyone involved in the financing, distribution and creation of Bollywood/Hollywood.’

He credits much of the box-office success to distributor Mongrel Media and its ‘extremely creative’ president Hussain Amarshi, who made the unusual move of picking up Bollywood while it was still in early development, and who later put half a million dollars into an ad campaign that included heavy postering and trailers, plus bus shelter, TV and billboard ads.

The movie opened Oct. 25 on two dozen screens in Toronto, Vancouver, Halifax and other key markets and, at last count, has brought in $1.2 million across Canada. Ticket sales continued to climb at several theatres, says Hamilton, thanks to strong word of mouth. Bollywood debuted in the U.S. on Nov. 22 and sales have been secured internationally by Fortissimo Films in 21 countries including Russia, Israel, the U.K., France and Germany. It opens in India on Dec. 27.

The story, penned by Mehta, is a send-up of Indian and Hollywood cliches revolving around millionaire Toronto playboy Rahul (Rahul Khanna), who is under pressure from his traditional family to settle down and marry a nice Indian girl. So, naturally, he hires a high-priced call girl (Lisa Ray) to pose as his finacee. Romantic hijinks and splashy musical numbers, courtesy of composer Sandeep Chowta, ensue. Rounding out the cast are Jessica Pare (Stardom) as Rahul’s WASP girlfriend and Pathak (A Passage to India), who died in October, as his cantankerous Grannyji.

‘We felt that the film would speak to any community in which families play a significant role,’ says Hamilton. ‘During the shooting…a Jewish member of the crew turned to me and said, ‘This is just like my family.”

The comedy has, however, played to increasingly chilly reviews as it has moved further from home. The Toronto Star and its sister freebee eye Weekly both gave it three stars and praised its daffy humor and multi-ethnic sensibility. The Globe and Mail was less kind, citing ‘fabulous idea/faulty execution.’ Down in the States, Variety and The Hollywood Reporter threw around words like ‘cheesy,’ ‘ill-conceived’ and ‘grotesque.’

‘I have never been able to understand the reactions of critics,’ says Hamilton.

It will be interesting to see how audiences react in Mehta’s Indian homeland. Indian political and religious extremists forced Mehta to abandon her previous film, the controversial drama Water, when the set in Varanasi was rocked by violent protests in early 2000. Some Indian audiences also reacted with hostility to Fire, which centres on a lesbian affair between two married middle-class women.

But Hamilton isn’t worried about Bollywood, and says recent promo screenings in India were met with ‘unmigitated enthusiasm.’

‘It’s hard to imagine that anyone could find anything objectionable about such a delightful film,’ he says, ‘but the creative genius for stirring up controversy exhibited…by the press has always surprised me.’

– www.mongrelmedia.com