Mumbai Meri Jaan
I have been lucky enough to live in several different cities of India. Having grown up in New Delhi, India my view of Mumbai (actually it was called Bombay then) was colored by a collage Bollywood cinema scenes from various movies from the black and white era to the times when color films were the norm. They would always show the millions of daily commuters who would cramp themselves in local suburban trains and spill out at Churchgate Railway Station or Victoria Terminus Railway station to get to their office in the commercial hub of India. The red colored double deckered buses that would efficiently ply along Marine Drive with the Arabian Sea swishing away audibly in the background. The dabbawallahs of Mumbai would deliver home made meals to the office goers efficiently through the afternoon in aluminium tiffin boxes that were mysteriously coded to be always delivered flawlessly across the supply chain. The faceless crowd would collect again in the evening to the Railway Stations and cram the trains that delivered them back to the suburbs with the same flawless efficiency of the dabbawallahs.
Then in the summer of 1983 I spent two months during a summer internship in Mumbai. That is when I fell in love with Mumbai. From the seedy lanes of Colaba where the druggies pushed dope surreptitiously in the bylanes to the children of the rich and famous who lived there. Across the road the Arabian Sea flirted with the slums of the fishermen that lived cheek by jowl with the tycoons apartment complexes. Bandra and Juhu were the suburbs where the movie stars lived. Director Nishikant Kamat's directorial debut in Hindi (he made a Marathi Film called Dombivli Fast) Mumbai Meri Jaan goes with the tagline "Salute the Spirit of Bombay" (not Mumbai?). When seven bombs go off in those packed trains what happens is unimaginable. The tribute is to the people of Mumbai who pull them up by the bootstraps and limp back to normalcy and in the same breath extend a helping hand to the neighbor who is too stunned to recover.
Written by Yogesh Vinayak Joshi, the film has Irrfan, Paresh Rawal, Soha Ali, Madhavan and Kay Kay Menon to boast of. What an awesome cast to have in a film. Each of them have a story to tell and they are all connected by the bomb blasts that took place for real on 11th July 2006 in the crowded local trains. The five stories run independently until they get braided together through the blast. If you are faint hearted, the SFX will completely psyche you. They look so real and ghastly.
"When you feel like crying, just urinate", says a policeman who is days away from his retirement to a rookie who is still in awe of his own uniform. The senior cop passes on his apathy to the new recruit when he tells him that in Mumbai "one should only watch a movie, never act in it". Never get involved no matter what you see around you. Somewhere it all changes when the tragedy has a human face. The TV anchor who loses her fiance and is still grieving while the TV Channel tries to milk the emotion to build their TRP ratings.
This is no commercial film. No song and dance or high pitched drama about long lost twins coming together, it is a slice of life film that narrates how a tragedy can evoke different responses among individuals. There is no judgement. there is no message. Just a brilliant narration of the story five people. Think Yun Hota to Kaisa Hota directed by Naseeruddin Shah or Life in a Metro (2007) directed by Anurag Basu. This movie jolts the viewers and forces a relook at one's biases that are hidden below the surface. Paresh Rawal and Irrfan left me stunned with their portrayal. Each of the characters is fleshed out to look real. The dialog is varied and the pace is crisp. All the ingredients that add to make a compulsive film ... thought provoking.
Rating: ****