Mumbai Meri Jaan

Rewind to July 2006. Until 10th July, it was just another monsoon month in Mumbai. On the 11th day it became the day the nerve of the city, the suburban rail, actually burst and oozed blood. The natural disaster that monsoon had caused the previous year, came back as a man made one to create panic, fear and chaos all over again. Everyone had a prayer on their lips that day, some for the departed, many for the untraced and everyone for the future. The next day, Mumbai came back to work. The media called it the Spirit of Mumbai, only the true Mumbaikar could sense that look on everyone’s face that day. The local trains were packed as usual but each of them had a new passenger, terror.
In Mumbai Meri Jaan, Nishikant Kamat, extracts that terror out of Mumbaikar’s hearts and places it on the screen. He visits homes, hearts and minds of all kinds and tells the story sitting in there. In a city where feelings are kept at home as people head out to work, the vulnerability of the average Mumbaikar is almost fictional. The heroic city has always been the image of the breadwinner, no feelings, relentless worker, stopping if anything to wipe sweat off the forehead. Kamat questions this beautifully as he travels upper middle class to the lowest class and derails every Mumbai stereotype. Soha Ali Khan, a successful media journalist finds her own tragedy being turned into a sound byte. Madhavan, that conscientious upper middle executive, who travels by first class for he finds cars a burden to the city, is forced to introspect and struggles to come to terms with his feelings that he can’t share with anyone, even though he has a family. He happens to be on the same train. The vulnerability of the average police constable is portrayed beautifully by Paresh Rawal, who submerges his frustrations under the guise of rustic humor. His younger colleague, idealist, isn’t as mature and almost succumbs to his frustrations. Irrfan Khan, a tea vendor, finds himself being increasingly alienated by a city finding Cappucino in malls more chic than cutting in thelas. He finds his own way of getting back at the city, no he doesn’t plant the bombs. Last but not the least, there’s Kay Kay Menon, as the right wing Mumbaikar who wild goose chases trying to trace the perpetrators of the blast is telling of the state of mind that some of our Mumbaikars are in
There is no story or to be fair there isn’t one story. If the director had his way he could’ve had told a story for every Mumbaikar and there’d be more to be said. The movie never really ends nor does it begin. Someone just took a slice out of our terror ridden lives and put it up there. And it moved me to tears.