Simon Reynolds Aug 7, 2019
The songs of Bruce Springsteen transform the life of a British-Pakistani boy in Gurinder Chadha's Blinded by the Light.
Sometimes you find salvation in the unlikeliest of places. For Blinded by the Light’s Javed (Viveik Kalra), a British-Pakistani boy growing up in ‘80s Luton, it comes in the form of denim-clad all-American rocker Bruce Springsteen. A first generation immigrant, Javed is caught between the desire of his strict father Malik (Kulvinder Ghir) to become a doctor or lawyer, and his own yearning dream to express himself through words and lyrics. All of this plays out against the backdrop of rising unemployment, the encroaching National Front, and Thatcherism.
Wrestling with his cultural identity, Javed finds clarity after his schoolmate Roops (Aaron Phagura) lends him a pair of Springsteen cassettes--the Boss, Roops says, is “a direct line to all that’s true in this shitty world.” Late one night,...
The songs of Bruce Springsteen transform the life of a British-Pakistani boy in Gurinder Chadha's Blinded by the Light.
Sometimes you find salvation in the unlikeliest of places. For Blinded by the Light’s Javed (Viveik Kalra), a British-Pakistani boy growing up in ‘80s Luton, it comes in the form of denim-clad all-American rocker Bruce Springsteen. A first generation immigrant, Javed is caught between the desire of his strict father Malik (Kulvinder Ghir) to become a doctor or lawyer, and his own yearning dream to express himself through words and lyrics. All of this plays out against the backdrop of rising unemployment, the encroaching National Front, and Thatcherism.
Wrestling with his cultural identity, Javed finds clarity after his schoolmate Roops (Aaron Phagura) lends him a pair of Springsteen cassettes--the Boss, Roops says, is “a direct line to all that’s true in this shitty world.” Late one night,...
- 8/7/2019
- Den of Geek
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