The Guru

An Indian dance instructor (Jimi Mistry) goes to America to become a movie star and winds up a sex-therapist self-help “swami,” romantically torn between a friendly porn star (Heather Graham) and a Park Avenue socialite (Marisa Tomei). There’s a soft core (pun intended) of erotic sweetness to this graceless farce, mainly thanks to the performances of Mistry and Graham, and the movie leaps fitfully to life during some surprising, exhilarating Bollywood-style musical numbers. But those modest virtues can’t prevail against the coarse jokes and shabby ethnic stereotypes of Tracey Jackson’s disjointed script, Daisy von Scherler Mayer’s unsteady direction or the unflattering cinematography (John de Borman). Christine Baranski flounces through as Tomei’s mother, and Michael McKean plays Graham’s porn impresario.