"I’ve been saying the movie is for everyone"
Karan Soni and Jonathan Groff’s upcoming rom-com A Nice Indian Boy is receiving universal praise.
The film premiered earlier in 2024 at SXSW.
It was screened at the BFI London Film Festival and has been praised by critics in first reactions, with Collider describing it as a “queer love story that blows right past some of the heteronormative love stories that have been dropped on streamers in recent years”.
Led by Karan, known for his role as Dopinder in the Deadpool trilogy, A Nice Indian Boy follows the “socially-reserved doctor Naveen”.
Naveen meets Jay (Jonathan) and they fall in love.
He then brings him home to “meet his traditional family”. Jay has to win them over before the wedding.
Naveen’s family must “contend with accepting his white-orphan-artist boyfriend and helping them plan the Indian wedding of their dreams”.
Karan explained that it is not a coming out story. It centres on where “you haven’t brought someone home yet”.
On the feedback he has received from parents, Karan said:
“They spoke about their own journey, with not going to their children’s weddings.
“They’ve come to peace with it years later, but they’ve missed chunks of their lives with their children.
“A lot of them spoke about, if they had a version of this movie earlier, maybe would have bridged that gap sooner.”
Director Roshan Sethi said: “I’ve been saying the movie is for everyone – for queer people, for not queer people, for Indian people, not Indian people.”
Boasting a 100% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, critics have praised the humour and performances of Karan Soni and Jonathan Groff.
Its refreshing representation of the LGBTQIA+ community in India has also been lauded.
Reflecting on the importance of criticism, Roshan told Attitude:
“It’s the most important thing.
“This is my second independent film, and third overall. In each case, independent films in particular, survive on the critics’ response.
“That’s what gets the attention of distributors, who are all reading every single review and looking at the Rotten Tomatoes score.
“It [makes it] easier to make the next movie as well. It makes a huge, huge difference. Also, people at the distributors often don’t believe there’s an audience for a movie. Critics often prove that there is.”
A Nice Indian Boy is expected to be released in cinemas in early 2025.
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