West is West, directed by Andy DeEmmony, is a fun, light-hearted comedy about self-discovery and coming of age.

The film, a sequel to the 1999 film East is East, focuses on the same dysfunctional Khan family from Salford, England, except it is now much diminished.

Set five years on from East is East, West is West takes off from Salford where Sajid (Aqib Khan), the youngest Khan, now a teenager, is going through a major crisis both at home because of his tyrannical father George (Om Puri) and at school where he is bullied by students for being a “Paki”.

The scene with his patronising teacher, played by Robert Pugh, who warns him about being bitten by the wrong mosquito that causes elephantiasis where the “balls swell like mangoes”, is stellar.

How does Sajid deal with it? He shoplifts, swears and runs away from school, forcing George to cart his “stupy” son off for a holiday to Pakistan and his wife number one Basheera (Ila Arun) in a last desperate bid to instil some Pakistani ideals in his “last one”.

What follows the transplantation from Salford to Pakistan is the usual cultural gags — from Sajid’s shock at a cow looking in through the car window to his horror at the thought of public defecation. Some brilliant acting by Aqib as Sajid, who has shed his furry parka for well-cut suits, makes the tired gags still tickle the funny bone.

But West is West is not just about Sajid, who becomes comfortable with his Pakistani identity with the help of a Dumbledore-esque pir — he even talks in riddles like him — and a budding bromance with Zaid, a local boy. It is also about the tyrannical patriarch George coming to terms with his two identities — George, the chip-shop owner and Jahangir, the farmer — and the repercussions of having left his wife and children for England 30 years back.

It is in his confrontations with his first wife and family, and with his second wife Ella (Linda Bassett), who arrives in Pakistan after George clears out their bank account to build a house in Pakistan, that the film becomes poignant. Puri plays the role of a man torn between guilt for what he did to his family in Pakistan and his duties to Ella, his wife of 25 years, with as much finesse as he played the angry and oppressive father in East is East.

Most of the lead cast from East is East are back in the sequel that is almost as good as the original — though West is West is far more cheerful and feel-good than East is East — and turn in top-notch acts.

Bassett returns with an equally powerful performance as the long-suffering English wife, while Arun is brilliant as Basheera. The scene between the two wronged wives, where one cannot understand a word of the other yet manage to communicate, touches the heart.

Lesley Nichol as Ella’s friend Annie is a comic treat; she continues in the light-hearted vein even in the most intense moments. Aqib and Raj Bhansali (who plays Zaid) add to it, whether it is trying to woo a Pakistani girl for his brother Maneer (Emil Marwa) or wanting to get married to a Pakistani “if they all milk cows like that”.

The blink-and-you-miss presence of Jimi Mistry as Tariq Khan is a disappointment, but the director includes a different treat — sufi singer Saeen Zahoor playing himself and singing several numbers.

All in all, West is West is an adult film with delightfully tender and funny moments, meant to be watched with the family. It’s sad that one had to buy five plex tickets just to stop the Friday morning show from being cancelled. Besides, watching it alone is not half the fun. Who wouldn’t love the comforting sound of fellow cinema-goers snickering at the witty one-liners?

east is east

The 1999 film directed by Damien ’Donnell, based on a play by Ayub Khan-din, followed the struggles of a half-British half-Pakistani family in Salford, England, where chip-shop owner George Khan forces his children, who have been born and brought up in Britain, to follow his strictly Pakistani ways but only succeeds in alienating them.