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Gurinder Chadha gives an update on Bend It Like Beckham 2 release date, Christmas bhangra song in Christmas Karma
Gurinder Chadha talks to us about the legacy of Bend It Like Beckham, the release plan for the sequel, her new film Christmas Karma and Christmas bhangra song
Gurinder Chadha is set to give Christmas a Desi twist with her upcoming release Christmas Karma, starring Kunal Nayyar, Billy Porter and Eva Longoria. This comes six years after her 2019 directorial Blinded By The Light. Ask her why it took her this long and she says, “There were three years of Covid and lockdown. Then after that, there was the actors’ strike. It took a while for the film industry in the West to recover, and it still hasn't fully. You'll find studios are either making big blockbuster films or streamers are making films. It's a tough time. The streamers have had a big impact on independent filmmaking globally. But I think it's picking up.”
The director reveals that Christmas Karma is a musical, and her ode to the late Italian-American director Frank Capra. “Every year I watch Frank Capra's film, It's a Wonderful Life (1946) on Christmas. It's an essential viewing because it's actually quite like an Indian film. I make my children watch it too and I sit there and cry. I just felt like I wanted to make a film that made me feel like that. So, Christmas Karma is my version of Frank Capra's film,” she says, that she has given her film an Indian twist with a Christmas Bhangra song. “It is killer. I wrote that with Malkit Singh and a few others, as I wanted us to have a traditional Christmas song as well to sing at Christmas.”
One of Gurinder Chadha’s most popular work in the 2002 film Bend It Like Beckham. Earlier this year, she had hinted at working on a sequel of it. Mention it and she shares, “The reason I didn't touch it for all these years was because I couldn't think of an idea that could better it. But given the success of female football and given the the way the Indian diaspora has flourished around the world and the impact that the film has had socially and culturally, there is global expectation on this. So, I'm taking my time. I'm exploring what we are going to do, how we are going to do it and I have some good ideas. The FIFA Women's World Cup is in 2027 and I want to make sure that we do something that lifts and feels as exciting as being at a match there. Hopefully we will release it before the World Cup.”
Reflecting on the impact that the film has had on the Indian diaspora in the West especially, Gurinder says, “My whole reason to make films was because I wanted to see people on the screen that looked like me in the cinema in the West. It was a very rare occurrence. We were either on the margins or not there at all. So my purpose was to put someone that looked like me right in the centre of the frame.” She adds, “It is a film that has touched a lot of people because it was the first time they felt seen. Even now they watch it again and again with their own kids because it was so rare to see a film from the perspective of an 18-year-old Punjabi Sikh girl living in Southall. It was the first of its kind and sadly there hasn't been many more as there should have been.”
Parting on an exciting note, Gurinder shares that there is a Bend It Like Beckham has a connect with Christmas Karma too. “I had asked Malkit if he would come and re-do the clip of his I used in Bend It Like Beckham of his song Jind Mahi. That song is now a TikTok or Instagram reel phenomenon and anytime anyone from anywhere comes to India, I've seen so many reels where they use that particular song. I've been so moved by that, so I asked him to do it again as part of my Bhangra song. He said ‘it's great but it's a bit old, let me do a new version’. So, he's done a Christmas version of the same song. That's why it's special because it's like I see it as apna, it's our song,” she ends.
