Beeba Boys

This screening took place on Thursday, February 11, 2016 at 7:30 pmYukon Arts Centre

Available Light Film Festival favourite Deepa Mehta is one of Canada's most singular cinematic visionaries — and her latest film is a bold addition to her body of work. Gang leader Jeet Johar and his young, loyal, and often-brutal crew dress like peacocks, love attention and openly compete with an old-style Indo crime syndicate to take over the Vancouver drug and arms scene. Blood is spilled, hearts are broken and family bonds shattered as the Beeba Boys (“nice boys”) do anything ”to be seen and to be feared”. In a white world. Mehta's kinetic drama is loosely based on the career of notorious crime lord "Bindy" Singh Johal and the Punjabi gangs of second- and third-generation Indian immigrants operating on Canada's West Coast in the 1990s. In English and Punjabi with English subtitles. "Jeet (rising Bollywood heartthrob Randeep Hooda) is a devoted family man and observant member of the Jat Sikh community. He is also a merciless gangster who fronts a pack of nattily dressed young toughs known as the Beeba Boys. Competing with other local Asian gangs for supremacy in the Vancouver drugs-and-arms-trafficking racket, Jeet leads his boys into battle to fight for their piece of this lucrative pie and for the respect they believe they deserve. Yet Jeet also finds time to mentor a volatile new gang member (Ali Momen) and seduce a beautiful woman (2011 TIFF Rising Star Sarah Allen) serving on the jury at the neophyte's murder trial. "Mehta shows us all the dark allure of the gangs' high-tension, male-centric world, one that beckons with the promise of glamour and fast money but demands a sacrifice all out of proportion to its rewards. Provocative and exciting — Beeba Boys offers a dynamic tale of violence, racism, discrimination, and marginalization, and at its core is a powerful story about family that is sure to resonate with any audience." -TIFF Producer David Hamilton in attendance. Regrettably, director Deepa Mehta has had to cancel her attendance at ALFF 2016. Deepa Mehta's travel was generously supported by Mehaffey Consulting Inc.