Today’s Special, part romantic comedy, part cultural study, starts off on a good note. It is the story of an American chef who comes face to face with his Indian heritage when he is forced to take care of his ill father’s ailing restaurant. In doing so, he finds love, his culinary intuition and attempts to mend his relationship with his parents: essentially My Big Fat Greek Wedding, but with poppadoms, not pittabread.

Sadly, it’s just not quite as good as its predecessor. Many of the characters (the angry, overweight father, the mother desperate for grandchildren) are too broadly and unrealistically drawn. The food, which ought to be a sumptuous, sensory feast, as it is in films such as Julie & Julia, is skimmed over. Where is the epicurean longing, the lingering shots of steaming Masalas and mouth-watering Biryanis?

That said, the script is funny in parts and the acting decent. Aasif Mandvi, as the lead, manages to achieve the tricky feat of looking simultaneously charming and pained throughout. And Naseeruddin Shah is amusing as Akbar, the eccentric and multi-talented cabbie-cum-chef who brings the restaurant back to life, particularly when he compares eating with a utensil to “making love to an interpreter.”

The problem is not really that this film has been done before. It is that it shows promise but fails fully to deliver. David Kaplan, the director, and Mandvi, the writer, have just missed the mark with it. But they are ones to watch.

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