Both Paul & myself are regular attendees of many of the Indian titles that get very small releases in Canadian cinemas. Yet this one comes with quite a bit of controversy even from its own country. Both of us had very wild reactions from our respective screenings! Read below.
ABOUT: Dastaar is a 2026 Punjabi drama that follows Harnek, a turbaned Sikh immigrant in 1980s Britain. After losing his loved ones to a brutal racist attack, Harnek channels his grief into courage. He rises from a humble newcomer to a revered community leader, ultimately proving that his turban can become a crown and a symbol of hope for his community.
Paul’s Reaction: This is a genuinely offensive piece of violent reverse racism, that serves as a call to arms for Sikhs who feel they have been disrespected. The film is mostly set in England where the Sikh ex-pats, according to this film, are treated to nothing but the most malevolent form of frothing-at-the-mouth British racism. Dastaar refers to the turbans worn by Sikhs, sacred symbols of their religious allegiance, their pride, and their courage. So when a group of skinhead yobs steal the turban of an elderly Sikh on the streets of London, it causes his son to seek revenge, especially when the equally racist British police advise them to not wear the turban in order to fit in. So, filled with righteous indignation, our hero arms himself and his fellow Sikhs with handguns and machine guns (in arms-free England? C’mon!) and take on the equally armed-to-the-hilt racist skinheads, all in slow motion, which is how all Indian heroes wipe out their enemies. This is just ridiculous jingoistic violent crap based on a deeply rooted persecution complex. After killing his enemies following a seven year truce, our Sikh hero gets elected to British parliament in his old age. When interviewed on the occasion of his successful ascent to a position of political power, he shares this ridiculous piece of wisdom “I may be the first, but millions more are coming.” Huh? Maybe something got lost in translation.
Rating: 3 out of 10
Jason’s Reaction: I had a lot of the same reaction that Paul did to this movie, and I will also add that I felt a lot of the material crossed my moral boundaries. In that it’s okay to use violence instead of dialogue to resolve an issue. Our lead characters here are quite morally bankrupt when they are loading up their guns to take on the evil white Brit gangsters and blowing them all away, and feel justified in doing so.
It has always been common in Indian cinema to treat White people as the evil bad guy. My #1 movie of 2022, RRR, even had this issue but at the very least our two heroes weren’t going around KILLING everyone and used dance instead of automatic weapons. I even feel in two instances here this movie goes full on Bad Chuck Norris, but at least in something like DELTA FORCE Norris & his team were using self-defense and logic as silly as all of it was.
I always want movies from other countries to appeal to more audiences as I feel so many people in North America are just watching multiplex slop and not trying movies from over the world (and don’t get me started on people who refuse to watch movies because they have subtitles). Dastaar certainly won’t attract a world audience and seems like it’s just made for its people and no one else. And as a final note, Dastaar is also the rare movie from India that does NOT have an interval, making the 165 minute runtime nearly interminable and forcing me on a bathroom break to miss some of the action. Either way, just be aware of the hypocrisy if you do find a screening of this one.
Rating: 4 out of 10
