Vijay - Il mio amico indiano

German actor Moritz Bleibtreu plays Will Wilder a German émigré who is a classically trained actor stuck playing a big green rabbit on Kids TV.

He is about to turn 40 and realises his life is struck in a rut. His marriage to Julia (Patricia Arquette) has lost his spark, his teenage daughter is moody and he thinks everyone have forgotten about his birthday.

When his car is stolen and later crashes, Will is mistakenly declared dead and in order to find out what people thought about him and to attend his own funeral he gets his Indian restaurateur friend Rad (Danny Pudi) to disguise himself as a Sikh called Vijay with a turban, fake beard and tan.

To his surprise his widow not realising who Vijay is wants sex with him and he strives to become a better person as he realises that his wife is actually happy herself after years of marriage.

This independent feature made with mostly European funding and a German director is meant to be an offbeat, quirky Billy Wilder inspired farce. However it is none of these things.

Just as Robin Williams and Dustin Hoffman were actors who turned to drag in Mrs Doubtfire and Tootsie to be close to people they love and become better people they were comedies that were both inspired, inspiring, funny and a central performance from the lead that rocked.

This is limp and unfunny with only Patricia Arquette giving a charged performance. I found the movie insipid and found it hard to believe that no one recognised a guy with an obviously fake beard, a turban and slightly browned off.

I found this movie adequately engaging for its first act. I liked its main character and it sort of had a cool premise.

It really runs out of ideas after that point though. I'm not sure what this movie wants to be. What the core points of conflict are I'm still not sure. I still struggle to believe no one recognized him as the ruse gets really over used and the story really depends on people acting in very specific ways.

A bit of a mess but not a hateable one.