Meet the Patels

“Meet The Patels” is a reflective documentary about the efforts of the producer, Ravi Patel, and his family (and various dating apps) to find a wife. In the process, the film makes for a very good (and long overdue) argument in favor of arranged marriages. Romantic marriages seem like the logical, natural, way to go in Western Society today, but the only reason it looks like this is the easy access to divorce, as so many people choose the wrong partners; without divorce family life would be even more horrible than it too often becomes. Ravi submits to the Family System (and what a system that turns out to be!) yet is pretty up front about what he wants, although that gets lost in the excitement, until he begins to wash out:He wants “All This”; The Indian extended family culture and life, but he wants it with a white woman as his wife. As the film starts he has a girlfriend, a sparkling, fun, nice, pretty (because as you’ll see, pretty is so important) red head named Audrey.They break up.As the film opens many Western viewers will no doubt carry a fairly dim view of arranged marriage. Who can forget the louts in “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” that Gus invites to dinner as potential suitors for his daughter, after she’s already introduced her (non-Greek) boyfriend to him? Or the hypocritical mothers in “Best Little Marigold Hotel” and “Crazy Rich Asians” who reject their son’s choices, only to have the film reveal that they themselves were initially rejected by their own prospective and eventual mother-in-laws on the same shallow grounds? And then there’s the news coverage, from Pakistan’s and India, of so-called “honor” murders of raped women, and women and men who marry across caste or religion, by their own families... Ewww.Ah, but the Patels. I’m told Patel is the Smith of India. There certainly are a lot of them, but they’re much more homogenous and organized as a group than any Smith. Not quite sure on the relationship they bear to each other, the film didn’t go into that. Ravi jokes (given how many of them own motels) “If I have to pay to stay somewhere, it’s because I haven’t made enough phone calls” and relates a story how as a child on a family road trip, they stayed at a Patel owned motel and how it was like a family reunion between them and the owners; of course they left the next day and never saw each other again.So, there is no Dolly Levi, Yenta Supreme. There is instead The System; it has an infrastructure, and it has international scope. Ravi’s Dad, who along with Ravi’s mother are both much more likable than Ravi turns out to be, explains the whole thing in a nutshell, how recommendations are weighted (family over strangers, close family over cousins and in-laws, etc) and then the movie shows us how it all works. For sheer functional complexity the System is outdone only by the dabbawalas of Mumbai’s tiffin community.My first question (momentarily forgetting I’m already happily married) was: Can I do that? I want to try that!I mean, if this system can’t find you a wife, YOU have a problem. As suggested earlier, Ravi has a problem.After the half-way point, and after most of the System has failed to find a match, Ravi and buds attend the annual (?) Patel Matrimonial Conference, which is a weekend speed dating and networking affair that acts to push those still single into finding a mate. As Ravi and his buds, in business suits, come out of their hotel room, they end up behind a white suburban American couple in shorts and T-shirts. The reaction from this white couple couldn’t have been more laughably pathetic: They flinched, and did a double take, as if they’d just seen a pair of Lakota warriors climbing through the hall window in nothing but war paint and loin cloths, carrying tomahawks. Really? Well, although Ravi and Co noted this all too typical racist reaction, we didn’t have time to linger on it, as by now we were learning what knocks potential mates out of the running. It’s not pretty, well pretty has a lot to do with it, never mind...Being fat, not attractive enough (especially, of course, for women) and being too DARK sum it up. One young Indian woman among those interviewed to illuminate the Indian family thinking on dating (which is largely avoided) was quite explicit: Her mother told her when she went to college: “No boys; No Blacks; No Muslims”. A skin bleaching product common in India is talked about. Nicknames for both desirable paleness and undesirable darkness are bandied about. It’s not a pretty picture of India, but then again, look at what we’re “discovering” about America and racism...By now, Ravi is sounding a lot like an incel—-those stunted young men who feel entitled to get laid by the most beautiful women in town, simply for being alive and white, despite having nothing (not even a personality) to attract them. Once rejected by the beautiful women (they probably didn’t even approach, because they were so timid and self loathing) they buy a gun and kill a lot of people. The distinction here is, while Ravi seems to want, and expect, a gorgeous Indian woman, he’s perfectly willing to settle for a more ordinary white woman, given that his rag doll body and often not terribly photogenic face (and his duplicitous personality as to what he really wants) aren’t winning a lot of suitors.But by now we now realize the whole exercise has been a waste:Ravi, in India, marveling at the Patel’s in their native land, realizes he broke up with Audrey because he wants this, the Indian Life, and wasn’t willing to live a double life.A) Ravi broke up with Audrey, not the other way around.Audrey eventually tells Ravi that their relationship by then is not based on friendship, but on her hope they’ll work to fix what went wrong and get back together.B) Audrey still loves Ravi and is willing to take him back.So why doesn’t he just go back to the girl he loves and try to have what he said he wanted at the start, “all of this” with a white wife?For one thing we wouldn’t have this entertaining movie if he had. What’s sad as so many reviewers note is not the movie or even its ending (which is not particularly sad) it’s Ravi’s character, he is a sad little man.

If you put aside the cultural Indian Hindu aspect and just watch a sorta young man try to figure out what kind of wife/life partner he wants, how to please his parents, how to date and reflect on relationships he's witnessed, it's a lighthearted documentary. I think no matter what your family's culture is, your parents have ideals about what race/education/wealth your future spouse should be. Many cultures have arranged marriages or filtered introductions to create the ideal or strategic bond. For some, they are following their parents' and grandparents' tradition and think it's good because they are happily married. For others, the thought of marrying someone you don't know or love yet is nonsense. In this case, you got to learn what the family's history/culture was and why marrying a Hindu was important as well as how much they valued family, marriage and children. The parents were charming and all along you see how much they love their son and their desire for him to be happy. The sister takes a back seat so you kinda miss out on the female perspective on arranged/filtered marriages. Another reviewer said it was racist but I disagree -- I think the parents were wanting the son to marry someone with similar background because there would be less stress, common values and a better chance for compatibility versus extreme opposites - ie a Buddhist marrying a Muslim or Catholic -- where there would be battles for values and beliefs. It was a bit hard to understand what the parents were saying so I turned on closed captions and that helped. It was amusing and I found myself hoping for a happy ending -- it implied a happy ending as you see a future clip that you can assume was his wife and child before the film ended so you had to piece it together. Don't want to say to o much more and ruin the ending.

I love a cute love story as much as the next person, but it irked me to watch yet another movie about rejecting one's own culture to fetishize Americanism. Specifically, yet another movie holding up thin, White womanhood as the "prize." They don't even try to sugarcoat it. He blatantly disses women because of their weight, despite not being a stud-muffin himself. Then, the complexion-based self-hatred was almost vomit-inducing. They bring up the Indian trope of the homely, wheat colored girl... then proceed to crack jokes about it. I'm not saying those aren't realities in Indian culture, but the filmmakers could have been portrayed/handled them a lot better on-screen than they were discussed. The lady with the "No boys, no Blacks, no Muslims" was totally unnecessary. And, questioning the girl from the first date why she has so many Asian friends (like India isn't in Asia *eyeroll*) was crass. We get it; we already know that by being "open" to dating non-Indians the ONLY non-Indians he (and his sister, for that matter) would consider are photogenic, affluent White people. In their quest to include Indians who have found happiness with non-Indian partners, not one single couple they interviewed involved an Indian with someone anything other than White. The scenes of him hanging out with his friends from other cultures are a few Indians and a few White people. Nothing else. You're in L.A., and there are no Latinos in this ENTIRE movie? The only Black guy is someone in the background at a friend's house, playing video games on the couch? Ravi did not need to throw that many different demographics under the bus to get the point across he was already in love with someone who isn't Indian before this entire quest started. He also should have dedicated more screen time to actually OWNING UP to his own biases, rather than trying to brush them side with lazily inserted side conversations. Ravi and Audrey have a sweet story that didn't need to be packaged this way. We non-White women get enough reminders that we're the leftovers everyday.

I enjoyed the DVD,although it was not quite what I expected. It was described to me as "laugh out loud funny" , and I did not find it so. It was, however, an interesting cultural piece, on the rituals and customs surrounding arranged marriages , both in the subcontinent and in the diaspora. It was an amateur production by a brother and sister about their own family, and the quality of the video reflected that, but it had authenticity and the family itself was congenial.

Seufz...als selbstbetroffene indischstämmige...ein Film, der einem aus dem Herzen spricht. Eine unterhaltsame Doku über Heiratswahnsinn und Familienirrsinn.Garantiert auch für nicht-Inder! ;)