check out the move "Outsourced" for something similar.

Don't forget Wes Anderson's Darjeeling Limited! 

I think you may be being far more skeptical than necessary. Though I believe that this trope exists and acknowledge that the movie may have stereotypical ideas at times, I believe it is about visiting a culture of which you are unfamiliar and discovering something about yourself. This is a very real occurrance for many people. It's about leaving what is familiar. There is nothng necessarily "Magical" about the place, it is the fact that it is different than your own place. That is the lesson here. 

You are projecting. If this is any trope, its a fish-out-of-water comedy.

I was particularly struck by the line "India is about what you bring to it."
Um.... no.  Probably not so much.  That's a good metaphor for your life, though.
Still, I <3 Judi Dench forever.  (Hmm.  "Judi Dench is about what you bring to her."  Nope, that doesn't work either.)

Indeed, they are talking about India in the exact same way that characters susally speak about magical persons. Really though, white privileged people having to "cope" with the "trials" of living in India (where they moved by their own will in order to be pampered)? Deserve a smack on the head, all of them.

The issue with this is kind of like the MPDG thing.. it treats country or the 'magical' person of color as a prop rather than a fully developed character.

As far as India goes, if the idea was that it was the landscape and only the landscape itself that inspired growth and change, but using the people as basically set dressing and props is what is particularly insulting.

I'd like to see someone turn this trope on it's head by having the magical person or people turn around and say 'Hello, you may not know this, but I have stuff of my own to attend to!! I don't have time to solve all of YOUR problems!'

So individuals should not learn anything about themselves from other individuals or cultures? No one has anything to teach us?

Anyone else think it's interesting that the people who are resettling in India are British? I don't know how this is interpreted sociologically, but as a historian this sticks out for me. 

Second, I actually like the comment that the movie makes about older people still learning, growing, discovering and changing. 

Don't forget the old women aren't interested in sex joke they threw in! Classy.

I got passes to see this next week and went and watched the trailer to see what the heck I would be watching.

Then I just sat there in stunned awe. 

Shame to see so many great actresses and actors in this movie.

This reminds me of the movie/book phenomenon, "Eat, Pray, Love."

Now all we need is the really hot "native" for one of the characters to fall for and to sex him/her up with exotic spice!  Then I can complete my bingo card!

I clicked on the Secret Life of Bees and saw Forest Gump thrown in the mix. How does that fit? Who was the magical character? 

"All the light, colours, smiles; it teaches me something." <-- Doesn't get much more explicit than that.I also agree that the fact these people are British is very interesting. This movie actually seems to be reproducing the same "magical" India that was a key part of The Secret Garden and The Little Princess. The more things change the more we grow attached to privilege.

in an amazing irony, the biggest 'magical negro' movie is Legend of Bagger Vance, which is based on an Indian source. So India is ultimately responsible for its own trope :)

or Christianity is the origin of the trope: poor, despised servant Jewish man exists solely for the the salvation of gentiles who despise him. 

I do understand about the magical negro. And I see the problem. But I have to admit I laughed myself to tears watching the trailer and I can't wait to see the movie. Of course this might be because I am nearing my golden years. And I live at an economic level closer to the Indians in the movie. Not to mention, the citizens of India in the trailer didn't seem all that magical. Just people with hopes and dreams like the rest of us. The truth is, when two cultures bump up against one another, growth and insight can occur. Race and culture are not the only differences here.  There is also age and youth. Most likely, deep down inside, the negro or "native" subconsciously represents parts of ourselves we have neglected so these kinds of "stories" help us hope we can reconnect with those lost qualities. However, at the same time these fantasies do make it difficult to relate in a healthy way to real individuals of races or cultures that we have romanticized in our imagination. The solution to the whole problem is probably Science Fiction such as "Avatar." 

This trope has been around forever with Westerners and India. "Passage to India", anyone? More interesting (to me) is the film that came out last year called "Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara" that took upper class Indians on a similar journey of discovery but set in Spain.

I'd also point out that Dev Patel is actually ENGLISH and him continually playing Indian raises some interesting questions regarding the great South Asian diaspora and their relationship to both the West and South Asia.

I haven't seen this film yet. So ignore my posts. It was silly of me to comment on a film I haven't seen.

I have a guilty feeling now, because I'm still going to watch the damn thing because my love for Dame Judi Dench is endless.

However, I won't pay a dime. 

Supposedly this film is based on These Foolish Things, but it seems to be quite changed from the book. In the book the old people aren't really so keen to go, it's because their children don't want them draining their inheritance with expensive old folks homes. I felt like part of the reason it was set in India was to compare the two different ways of dealing with old people, the comparison being between the traditional idea of Indians respecting the elderly, and the idea that in Britain OAPs are seen as a burden.

The book even touches on the idea of mystical India and how it's not real. It's interesting that the movie seems so divorced from the novel, which is really not about travelling to an exotic country and learning something important from the magical people there.

I thought the trailer was a clever Indian Tourist Board commercial.  In the real world, Indians are quite pleased with their country being so economically and culturally 'hot' these days.  I know... tourism is problematic; Bollywood is problematic; cricket is definitely problematic; Capitalism is problematic, etc.

Yep, exactly what I saw.

I have been watching United States of Tara, and have been pretty impressed with how the show handles mental illness. However, I noticed in season 2, there is the magical negro. Interestingly, the last time we see the character, she is calling the white people out for treating her as such. And then we never see her again. They came to her, got their problems solved, and returned to suburbia.

I see what you're talking about, but I don't think I view it as racism, at least not in a negative way. It seems more like movie makers using white characters to connect to a white and multicultural audience, to make them see India in a new, more loving, beautiful light, instead of the ways they'd be portrayed on Fox.

yep!! barf

Just be honest with yourselves.
It's not about the country itself, it's about being special and unique in a setting where you are a minority and can feel exotic yourself. that wouldn't work in Maine or Russia, but it would work in India, Africa or any other country in Asia or where they have brown skin.
You, as a white person such as these people in the movie, want to feel like "Here I am alone in a foreign country where I am the only one with white skin, the brown skinned people will look at me and I will feel special and like i'm in the 1800 century". You want to look down your nose at them and feel superior, that's what I have noticed anyway. Some of them thrive on it like the character in the awful movie eat pray love. It's pathetic. Some of them look at you like you're a genie "Teach me something you wise one". I laugh, literally because it's so embarrassingly pathetic.  A lot of them feel like they're the default human being and everyone else is just a character in their movie (life). Props here to guide, teach and serve them.
I wonder where they've gotten that idea....

Maybe let's phrase things more on the line of Orientalism and essentalizing, and less on the 'Magical Negro'. For the sake of clarity.

More Dev Patel, ugh! there are other actors in India.

I'm not a sociologist so I guess I'm not really qualified to comment, but I am British and I saw this movie in full a couple of weeks ago.  The focus (for Indian and British characters alike) is on not letting social barriers like prejudice or expectation get in the way of doing what you love in life.  All the characters feed from each other, the 'white privileged people' are not benefactors with India facilitating their happiness and the only trials they overcome are in their own heads.  Same for the Indian characters.  Older Brits are quite often prejudiced towards South Asian immigrants and their British Asian descendants and and I thought they were very thoughtfully portrayed as those issues were tackled.  

Incidentally there is a side story about a man who had a gay relationship when he was a teen/young man growing up in India, and had left after they had been exposed and he felt he'd brought shame to the family.  When he returns, he finds his former lover and the woman he has married, who knows who he is, that they were in love, and in front of her they embrace, dispelling the British character's long-held belief that he had brought shame on the honour of the family (there are many preconceptions in Britain regarding Indian family honour) and in fact nicely demonstrating that life goes on and people are people wherever you are.

I guess perhaps this trailer doesn't do the film justice, in which I recommend you watch the whole film, perhaps in a more British, rather than Western, context and see if it changes your views.  I guess perhaps it won't, and as I say I could be wrong as I haven't studied these things, but it might!!

I'm not so sure it's the magical negro thing. The trailer suggests that a change in their lives and the removal of certain inhibitions has allowed the characters to shake loose their prior limits and enjoy life again. It could have happened anywhere. For the viewer it simply provides a cultural counterpoint and some exotic comic relief.