“We all want to be gangsters,” says Ali Moman of his new movie , which loosely chronicles the life of infamous 1990s Indian-Canadian gangster Bindy Johal.
“I mean you listen to hip-hop,” Momen continues. “Everyone wants to be like ‘I’m a gangster… you’re a gangster…’”
Moman portrays Nep in Beeba Boys, a young Indian-Canadian guy who finds himself stuck between two dangerous B.C. gangs. Moman’s Neet Neet is part of Randeep Hooda’s gang, who portrays Jeet Johar, a character based on Bindy Johal. Hooda and Gulshan Grover, who plays a rival gang leader, are well respected actors in Bollywood, but Beeba Boys also features several notable Canadian actors— including man-bun-wielding Paul Gross, who had a particular impact on Momen.
“In my eyes, you know, Paul Gross is one of the greatest Canadian actors. He’s one of the greatest artists we’ve ever produced,” Momen says. “That’s when I had a star crush, was the two days I spent working with Paul Gross.”
Momen could soon stand beside Gross as a Canadian acting legend. Momen is a Thornhill native, and although Beeba Boys represents his first lead in a movie, he has been making a name for himself on the Canadian theatre circuit in the ten years since he graduated Sheridan College’s theatre school, where he’s also employed as an instructor.
Momen hopes Beeba Boys can give him the opportunity to break into the movie business, but it’s not a clear path considering that has garnered somewhat mixed reviews. While praised for its arresting visual style and pacing, the film’s treatment of historical events has been criticized for its outlandishness.
There’s some logic to the criticisms, but I still found it to be a fun movie. I’m a fan of gangster movies, and for me falls into a similar category as 2013’s Gangster Squad, which also received unfavourable reviews and few viewers, but really wasn’t that bad. (Gangster Squad is also a good comparison to because both movies are based on pretty interesting historical events from Vancouver.)
If you look into the actual details, Johal really is almost a Canadian Michael Corleone and you can see why people would idolize him, and one of the most significant part of the movie comes at the beginning of Beeba Boys: a montage of interviews with several young boys with Indian/Middle-Eastern backgrounds who all admire Johal.
Johal was a violent criminal and in that regard isn’t an example for anybody, but the fact is that even today, even many economically well off Indian and Middle-Eastern Canadians feel separated or threatened by mainstream/white Canadian society. In a way, it makes sense that young people in this group might admire a person like Johal who was unafraid to take on and threaten the mainstream.
The movie also indirectly sheds some light on how Canadian youths from an Indian or Middle-Eastern background can fall victim to recruitment campaigns from terrorist groups, and in our conversation I got a chance to talk with Momen about this aspect of the movie.
“That’s why when the Prime Minister greeted the Syrian refugees with hugs and wanted it to be on TV, that wasn’t just like ‘Oh my God, I love these people, I’m going to be a nice guy…’ that was an anti-terror thing,” says Momen. “… Let’s prove that we are embracing [Syrian migrants], and it makes the argument that ISIS makes more difficult.”
“If… [Syrian migrants] feel like they don’t have the opportunity to rise up the ladder in this country, but all of a sudden someone says ‘Hey come here, you want money? You want clothes? You want girls? You want whatever? I got it for you,’” says Momen about the potential of disenfranchised Syrians forming a Johal-style gang. “If you think that, listen, the best I got is like being a gangster for ten years of my life before I get shot, I’m going to take it.”
“But at the end of the day the reason we don’t become gangsters is that our brain kicks in and we realize that, yeah, it looks really great right now, but there’s nothing glamorous about a body bag,” Momen said. “And if I keep this lifestyle up, that’s what’s gonna happen, I’m gonna die. And in fact everyone dies in Beeba Boys. With the exception of Nep.”
Innis College is hosting a screening of Beeba Boys on January 28. Tickets are available via online registration through Innis. Watch for more details when they’re available and come out if you like gangster movies, and let’s hope to see more movies from rising star Ali Momen in the near future.
