East is East

In the film, East Is East, the issue of racism, and religion is addressed through the theme of Muslim family life. A Muslim Pakistani family live in north Manchester in the 1970’s and it shows how two cultures collide in one family as the father married a white, British woman. East Is East shows how traditional Muslim standards fail to get through to modern Muslim children and how they dis-obey the rules set by Allah and the Qu’ran. The family that is shown is the Khan family, consisting of Ella and George (The mother and father) and Sajid, Meenah, Saleem, Tariq, Nazir, Manir and Abdhul. The film concentrated on the difficulties of a mixed race family, with modern, young children, and a white mother. It showed the mother allowing the children to rebel against their father’s strict rules and upbringing (EG. Eating bacon and drinking on nights outs). It showed Ella allowing George’s demands to avoid being beaten, rather than embracing the values of Islam herself. Many of the expectations from George were forced upon them. EG. Saleem being circumcised, forced marriages and the children being taken to Madrassah (Mosque school). There was only one child of Georges, called Manir, who accepted George’s Islamic faith as his own, and he was ridiculed, by his brothers and sisters for it.

There are many second and third generation Muslims living in Britain today, and they face the dilemma of trying to maintain their religious tradition and please their elders, or immerse themselves in a modern liberal British society. Muslim youth may appreciate issues the film raised as it highlights the difficulty of being a modern, young Muslim in an ever changing world, where they are expected to be traditional Muslims, and follow their faith. Also, they experience difficulties fitting in with modern white cultures, and other people that aren’t Asian. Muslim elders could be told about the annoyances and trouble Muslim youths run into when being force to practise religion.

I think the treatment of religious people was fair as modern Muslims may have another wife and leave her in Pakistan to come to England, then remarry. However some people may disagree, George was portrayed as ruling through fear and power, not as a good Muslim father should – Teaching their children good manner through the word of Allah. Ella was also portrayed as a weak mother and not as a faithful Christian by sticking to her Christian commitments to honour and obey her husband by letting her children disobey Islamic rules. The leader of the Mosque was portrayed fairly though, as he told George that unless his children were fully members of a Muslim community they would always be a worry to him, which is sound advice from a Muslim cleric.

In my opinion seeing an equal balance in the film would be good, e.g. Making Ghandi have an arranged marriage, because he would go through with it to follow his faith, and also make Ghandi less of an outcast, and more accepted by his family would be fun to see, as his family disrespect him for following the Muslim faith strictly.