CANNE-DEMONIUM

The scene resembled that of a pre-independent era, set in the Indian territory of Puducherry, where the French were trying to infiltrate India and inflict pain upon us with their advanced weapons. Except that it was mid-May 2007 in the French town of Cannes and it was the Indians trying to infiltrate France and inflict pain upon them with our Bollywood movies.

One of the stars who made her presence felt at the Cannes Fest was Preity Zinta who was there to promote her theory that she did not have an affair with Louis the XVI that caused a rift between him and Marie Antoinette. The French media responded by asking her, “Qui l’enfer vous est?” (Who the hell are you?). She screamed a flurry of obscenities in Hindi at them and asked them to pardon her French.

Rumors floated that Hrithik Roshan was seen flying around the area with his right hand up in the air screaming, “The double-thumb is here.”John Abraham, covered in designer wear, was seen talking to the French reporters about how he would never part with his middle class upbringing. Holding his hand throughout the fest was girlfriend Bipasha, dressed in a formal bikini, complaining about how her boyfriend would never part with his middle class upbringing.

Another major attraction at Cannes was Shilpa Shetty who was patently having a good time posing and smiling for the paparazzi who mistook her for the French independent director Pierre Packi Currie. And when they started calling out “Packi! Packi! Currie! Currie!” to get her attention she broke down into tears and whined about how they weren’t even trying to see her for who she truly was¾just a really bad actress.

A curious incident transpired in the middle of the festival where the French Police managed to capture an Indian born stalker who was, apparently, studying each and every move of Angelina Jolie. The police later revealed the stalker to be Sushmita Sen who confessed that she was merely stalking Angelina Jolie to get tips on how to adopt more successfully. Conspicuous by his absence was Shah Rukh Khan who was not invited to Cannes this year after the demented humor sense he exhibited last year where he made puns like “King Cannes” and “Khan/Cannes Banega Crorepati”. He was given a memo that read “Khan canned from Cannes.”

The focus of attention, although, was, unsurprisingly, the Bachchans who finally gained access to the Cannes portal through the latest addition to their family, Aishwarya Rai. The entire Bachchan family was present including Amitabh, Abishek, Aishwarya, and the motherly figure of Amar Singh. A slight scuffle occurred between Amitabh and the security guards when Amar Singh’s name was found missing from the guest list. However, Amar Singh was allowed to enter after Amitabh explained that they were actually Siamese twins who had very recently been surgically separated by chief surgeon Dr. Mayavati.

The Cannes Film Festival 2007, with its booming success, marked a new high for Indian snobbery and a new low for filmmaking. This year’s fest was described as the most smoothly run event in all of the sixty years of Cannes. There was, however, some panic created when the entire event was put on hold for about twenty minutes; men in uniform cordoned the entire area and circled the guests. Things calmed down, later, when it was revealed that the security issue arose as the Bachchans had to take a bathroom break. And as everyone knows that is a strictly family affair.