DVD Review: The Masala Bhangra Workout: Volume 1...Funky Style

Sarina Jain, the "Indian Jane Fonda", has created a series of classes that use the beat and moves of Bhangra dancing as an aerobic workout. I originally requested this DVD because of my Belly Dance classes (Bhangra is becoming a very popular addition to the "fusion" aspects of belly dance, and it is awfully fun to watch); but I thought I'd put my experience out there for the general public.

My first thought was: How cool, Sarina Jain is actual size! She is--she's built like an athletic and healthy woman, only as thin as she should be. (I am very tired of seeing bone-and-sinew thinness being touted as the epitome of health. It ain't). She's lovely to look at, all perfect teeth and perfect hair, even during the most strenuous phase of the workout. Since the workout seemed to be one (almost) continuous live staging, that was impressive. Of course, I know the ability to keep one's hair & makeup perfect whilst egging the rest of us on to a sweat is one of the chief requirements for a career as a video exercise instructor. Yet I'm always inordinately impressed by this. (If you've seen the sheer volume of my hair, you'd understand.)

The thing I liked best about this DVD? It was only 36 minutes. I'm not being facetious; there are plenty of dance/exercise videos that I have not sat down and worked through, because I have a lot of trouble putting 60 or 90 minutes together to do someone else's workout. So 36 minutes seemed just about perfect to me. The actual workout phase is probably only 30 minutes, from warmup to cooldown. Again, that length seemed just perfect, especially since movement is nonstop for that entire time.
I worked through the video once by myself, and a few nights later, I enlisted my in-home tester to work out with me. I wanted the impressions of a non-dancer as to difficulty level, and he gladly gave them to me.

The program suffered from a common problem in the exercise industry: a lot of moves were thrown at us, and none of them were explained in depth. They were, however, repeated over and over. I found that I caught on to most of the moves by the last repetition, but only because I have experienced many frustrating dance classes (the kind where I am always three steps behind the instructor). My in-home tester was so frustrated by the lack of explanation that he gave in, 3/4 of the way through the workout. Not because he couldn't handle the bouncing and sweating, but because he was completely annoyed.

The workout is almost all bouncing. Not easy on the knees at all, nor the ankles, for that matter. The bouncing gets the heart rate up, and the moves are somewhat challenging mentally, as long as you don't get frustrated by the non-explanation. Jain has a nice patter going as aerobics instructors go--you might find her "hup!" exhortations and counting down annoying, if you aren't used to this sort of thing. She is encouraging to her (unseen) audience, and her backup dancers--2 young women, 2 very young men--are unfailingly enthusiastic. The warmup and cooldown are brief but well-done.

I would recommend this DVD only to those who have a good sense of body mechanics and know their own bodies well enough to stop if something hurts. If you are used to dance classes and aerobics classes, this is a fun and energetic workout, a nice change from the routine. If you love Bollywood, you'll have a ball pretending to be one of the dancers in the big crowd scenes.
If you have any kind of knee problems, I would not recommend this DVD at all. No modifications are offered, and I don't think most of the moves would work for those with joint pain.

If you are a dancer looking to pick up some new moves, this is probably not the video for you. Most of the moves are hybrids of Bhangra, hip-hop, and aerobic bouncing, although the hand movements are different and fun to watch, and the combinations feel more like dancing than aerobic combinations usually do. I must admit, I had a gigantic grin on my face through most of the combinations--something that never happened back in my aerobics-class-attending days.

I am looking forward to working out with some of the other five videos in the Masala Dance stable. If you try this one or any of them, let me know what you think!

I found this video at Netflix.