The Love Guru

The Love Guru
What an amazing guru he is...not!
Genre: Romance Comedy Directed By: Marco Schnabel Written By/Screenplay: Mike Myers Graham Gordy Starring: Mike Myers Justin Timberlake Jessica Alba Romany Malco Meagan Good Verne Troyer John Oliver Omid Djalili Ben Kingsley Daniel Tosh Photography: Color Distributed By: Paramount Pictures Release Date: June 20, 2008 Runtime: 87 minutes Country: United States

The Love Guru is a 2008 American romantic comedy film directed by Marco Schnabel in his directorial debut, written and produced by Mike Myers and starring Myers, Jessica Alba, Justin Timberlake, Romany Malco, Meagan Good, Verne Troyer, John Oliver, Omid Djalili and Ben Kingsley. The film was also Myers and Timberlake's second collaboration after Shrek the Third, which was released the previous year.

Plot

Maurice Pitka, an American raised in India by gurus, returns to the States in order to break into the self-help business. His first challenge is to settle the romantic troubles and subsequent professional skid of a star hockey player whose wife left him for a rival athlete.

Why He's a Hate Guru

1. This movie is very offensive to Indians due to religiously insulting portrayals of Hinduism, Sikhism and to a lesser extent, Islam, the three major religions of India.
2. Offensive portrayals and stereotypes.
3. Excessive use of juvenile and sex jokes, and any non-sexual jokes are poor rehashes of jokes from Mike Myers' previous, better films like Wayne's World, Austin Powers and so on.
   • The guru's names are also pretty unrealistic and stupid, such as Guru "Hathasmalvena" (have a small wiener) and "Tugginmypudha" (tug in my poona.)
4. Weak and poor acting, especially from Justin Timberlake and even Mike Myers himself.
5. Poor and clumsy dialogue, such as Guru Tugginmypudha's "Good distraction frees us from emotional pain. Bad distraction gives you a mouth full of whizz."
6. Verne Troyer's and Jessica Alba's characters, Punch Cherkov and Jane Bullard, are treated like punching bags throughout the film.
7. Shameless and blatant product placement, such as logos for McDonald's, Footlocker, Xbox 360, and the PlayStation Portable placed around the hockey arena.
8. Out of place pop culture references, such as a scene where the Law & Order sound effect is used after Pitka greets Mariska Hargitay.
   • Speaking of Mariska Hargitay, the use of her name as a greeting in lieu of "namaste" makes very little sense, as Hargitay is of Hungarian descent, not Indian.
9. Unnecessary and pointless cameos such as Val Kilmer, Kanye West, Jessica Simpson and even Deepak Chopra himself.
10. Even Myers himself apparently regrets making the movie, judging by shots he later at it while guest-starring on Saturday Night Live.
11. Terrible special effects. In the flashback scenes, Pitka is played by a child actor with Myers' face put over the child actor's head, which looks rather creepy and makes Pitka’s head look way too big.
12. Guru Pitka is a pretty unlikable character, especially as he's supposed to be wise and intelligent, and yet he mocks little people (like Cherkov) and homosexuals. Also, he shows that he was a love guru for the Beatles, alongside Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, two relationships which are notorious for breaking up, meaning that for a love guru, he's not very good at his job.
13. Some plot holes:
    • How did Guru Pitka get hurt by Coach Cherkov punching him in the balls if he was wearing a metal chastity belt with an elephant on it? If anything, it should've been Cherkov who got hurt, not Pitka.
    • The voice-over machine at the start of the movie looks completely different from the one shown later on.
    • It's never explained how Pitka went to the toilet if he's been wearing the chastity belt for over 30 years.
14. The climax of the movie revolves around Pitka distracting the hockey game audience by getting two elephants to have sex in an ice hockey rink. Yes, really.
15. The film was so bad it literally killed Mike Myers' career, as he stopped working on acting, until Bohemian Rhapsody completely saved his legacy.

Redeeming Qualities

1. The movie is pretty short for a feature-length film- only 88 minutes and there's no bloopers or outtakes during the credits.
2. The costume designs do fit the setting pretty well.
3. A few good musical numbers, particularly in the opening "9 to 5" rendition.
4. Verne Troyer was allowed to keep the miniature furniture created for his character, so at least his time wasn't completely wasted by being in the film.
5. It has an appearance by John Oliver before he was in Last Week Tonight.

Reception

The film was a financial flop, and earned overwhelmingly negative reviews. Film critic Richard Roeper named it as the worst film of 2008. The film's poor reception nearly killed Mike Myers' film career, as he's largely retired from the big screen outside of the Shrek franchise and documentaries and otherwise moved into becoming a painter. Myers wouldn't return to the media until the ABC reboot of The Gong Show in 2017.

Awards

The Love Guru won three Golden Raspberry Awards; including Worst Picture, Worst Screenplay, and Worst Actor for Mike Myers.

Trivia

• It is one of the last times Mike Myers did film writing while he still kept his voice acting career.
• The character of Maurice Pitka was originally planned to appear in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, but was ultimately shelved.
• English comedian Omid Djalili received prominent billing despite his one scene as Guru Satchabigknoba being removed from the theatrical cut. It would be included as a deleted scene on the Blu-ray release.
• Prior to the movie's release, Deepak Chopra defended the movie, but several weeks after the movie's release, he admitted that it was terrible.
• Mike Myers has since made it clear that he regrets making the film, and has made insulting references to it during his guest appearances on Saturday Night Live.
• Like most of his movies, Mike Myers reportedly acted difficult to work with.

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