Beeba Boys: Interviews with Deepa Mehta, Ali Momen and Randeep Hooda

Writer/Director Deepa Mehta (Midnight's Children, Water) is one of Canada's cinematic treasures. When it comes to her vision she never disappoints and Mehta's latest film is a strong and memorable addition to her body of work.

The Beeba Boys

Beeba Boys is a high energy drama loosely based on the Punjabi gangs of second- and third-generation Indian immigrants operating on Canada's West Coast in the 1990s.

The film stars Bollywood star and heart throb Randeep Hooda as Jeet Johar,  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 serving on the jury at his murder trial.

Randeep Hooda was the only actor Mehta wanted to play the lead, mainly because her own mother insisted. Her mother, a huge fan of Hooda's work told her daughter that she should cast him in her next movie. As the saying goes, mother knows best and Mehta arranged for a meeting. Hooda was honored and thrilled to make his way to Canada to work on the film with Metha and the talented cast. 

Mehta concentrates on the 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. Intense and thrilling,  Beeba Boys offers a dynamic tale of violence, racism, and  discrimination, but mainly it's a powerful story about family and how it trumps everything else. 

The Beeba Boys stand out in a crowd, not only because they are feared but because of the way they look. The boys wear only the finest suits, jewels, watches and shoes (sans socks of course)! 

I spoke with Deepa Metha and her stars Ali Momen and Randeep Hooda about working on Beeba Boys and the challenges they faced shooting the film.  Check out the interviews below. 

Beeba Boys opens October 16 across Canada, including Toronto!