If you know Aasif Mandvi only as a satirist from the Jon Stewart show, this movie will educate you further to the fact that Mr. Mandvi is evidently an actor also, and not too shabby an actor at that, although the role that he plays is apparently very close to his real-life story of coming to America at a young age and seeking the American Dream.
Today’s Special, as the name suggests, revolves around the story of a young man caught up between living the life of an uptight sous chef in an upscale Manhattan restaurant and coming to terms with his immigrant roots when the family business (of which he is no part of initially) is in danger of folding. Having no choice but to shelve his own dreams of becoming a chef known for Parisian fare, Mandvi settles for repairing the small restaurant even as he repairs his relationship with his doting and disappointed parents.
Not entirely unpredictable in plot, but entertaining nonetheless, Today’s Special showcases the Indian American milieu in the Jackson Heights area of the borough of Queens, New York– a place that is unique for its pulsating quality of everything from the motherland.
Madhur Jaffrey and Harish Patel are pretty good in their stereotypical rendition of Indian American parents, and Naseeruddin Shah is quite impressive as the stereotypical NYC cabbie with a very Yankee accent to boot. My only complaint with him is that he ought to have taken a little more care with his Indian pronunciations, in particular, the word ‘dosa’ that he kept pronouncing with a hard ‘d.’ That’s not cool, dude!
