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Some movies are made with a certain niche audience in mind. The demographic might be along specific age or cultural divides, but in Shook (written by Adnan Khan and Amar Wala, and directed by Wala), the central niche audience is geographical. The film is filled with specificity to Toronto, making it especially resonate for a local audience, and the jokes landed well – even at the usually more subdued morning P&I screening. This was particularly apparent in the scenes and jokes about the TTC, which got a loving, but biting, portrayal, particularly the Blue Night Bus, which anyone who has had the misfortune of missing the last green train (east-west) tends to fear. These scenes resonated with me, and I was not alone in the audience as they got a big reaction. But these were jokes and humour that were layered in specifically for a local audience, but won’t get the same reaction outside of the city. This is what I mean by niche – but I don’t think just because there is specificity in the humour that it is a bad thing.
Often Canadian films tend to go very broad, to try to be universal, and can end up coming across as lacking place. I refer to these films as being set in Anywhere, USA. There is no specific place, but it’s vague enough that it could be somewhere in the US even if everyone involved is Canadian. There is a lack of identity. While the Toronto jokes and the full nature of the TTC jokes will be lost to those unfamiliar with racing for the last train, the ideas behind what is being said won’t be. And, it allows Toronto to be more fully realized as a character to those not from here, which isn’t something it usually gets to do as it often plays other cities.
The main story of Shook is of Ashish/Ash (played by Saamer Usmani) who is a writer with an MFA who’s written a novella that was well received but is struggling to get it sold or write something new. At the same time, he’s recently moved with his mother (Nisha played by Pamela Sinha) and brother (Hari played by Sharjil Rasool) into a condo after his parents divorced due to an affair that his father (Vijay played by Bernard White) was having. His life is further upturned when the father he’s been avoiding turns up to tell him he has Parkinson’s, all the while he’s embarking on a relationship with Claire (played by Amy Forsyth), a relationship with a clear expiration because she’s starting her MFA in Montreal soon.
But at its core, the story is about Ash reevaluating his relationships with his family and how he speaks, relates, and perceives them.
There is this wonderful bit about how Ash and other South Asians move through the world even in a city as culturally diverse as Toronto with a bit about coffee orders and names asked and given. See, when Claire and Ash meet, she’s working as a barista at a coffee shop he’s going to, and when she asks for his name, he says Alex. And she won’t accept it from him, asking for his real name eventually drawing out Ash, and then Ashish as they banter, only when she writes the name on the cup after he’s sure she will spell Ashish wrong, she surprises him by giving him her name. It’s a fun play on the meet-cute, that pays off later when Ash explains that he and other “brown guys” all have “white guy names,” with his being Alex.
Shook is a film that doesn’t wrap everything up in a neat happy ending. Ash doesn’t end the movie with the cure Parkinson’s (there isn’t one), a way to move into the city, or a way to get anyone to write your name right on a cup of coffee if you have a name that isn’t basic, like Alex, (though he does try to embrace Ashish near the end of the film to great comedic results), but at the same time you leave feeling like Ash is in a better place with his family, and, like you really want to eat some Hakka.
Shook had its World Premiere at the 49th annual Toronto International Film Festival in the Discovery section.
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