Life in a metro full#
Maybe it's the fact that, in a film full of flawed, real people, we end up liking them all too darned much. It's a Hindi-English film (with a smidgeon of Bangla) and there are elements of dumbing-down, of sharp dialogue sadly blunted by explanatory replies or additions. Conceded, it is indeed hard writing such a mixed genre film - rom-com, melodrama, slice-of-life, tragedy, whimsy - but there are moments the words make you wince, slightly. While Basu's fleshed out his characters very well, there are moments of either a complete predictability or a predictable defiance, the obvious way of going against the grain. The script definitely needed a couple more coats of honing.
Maybe it's because when Shiney Ahuja asks if Shilpa Shetty loves her husband, the actress replies ' haan,' her Hindi smacking you right between the eyes. Not just do we long for the studly actor of years gone by, but we chastise ourselves for having forgotten him, and - while thoroughly charmed by his talk about fish and his strapping, single-handed desire to weld the city's impossible traffic his way - as men, we're plain jealous. Maybe it's the inevitable envy Dharmendra makes us feel, with a touching, tender portrayal in the warmest and most irresistible of the film's arcs, a simple romance with the gracefully timeless Nafisa Ali. And it is here that the filmmaker goes clever, creating excellently-etched, relatably real characters and casting them flawlessly, taking away yet another cause for complaint. The Shilpa/Shiney story is almost humdrum the Konkona/Irrfan story is obvious romcom and, as mentioned, the others are a Hollywood comedy, soured. While Basu joins the dots unambiguously during his first act, making it clear that this is no coming-together-of-random-people film, there are shades of predictability to each story arc. Maybe it's because the stories, in themselves, seem commonplace. Mr Lyricist, the call here is for narrative, not universality. And while the rocky ballads work well enough in furthering the story, they try to bridge too ambitious a divide by singing for all the characters, and the audience. A few favoured musical collaborators - composer Pritam leads the group, and (it is rumoured) Basu slaps the drumskins himself - act as sutradhars, a la the Farrelly Brothers film mentioned in this piece's title. Maybe it's the Metro band, which often enters the scene abruptly. Her English makes you wince, but then you look around, and it's like women from Mumbai, and we meet them all the time. This is an unconventionally talented actress moving up steadily, and her straight-hair-n-specs look will win her even more fans. The pert young thing is, incredibly, both refreshing as a daisy and darkly compelling as a vampire, and manages to herd her emotions well, playing a complex role but hardly ever overreaching. Maybe it's Kangna Ranaut's accent, for one can't really complain about the pretty, interesting actress. To his credit, the director handles it well, neatly using some fine actors to stretch dramatic tension to the fullest.
This is a deep, melancholy film about real characters, and while the situations on this track directly echo Wilder, it's more bitter than sweet in Basu's hands. While the Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine masterpiece is a comedy, Metro takes its cues and premise, choosing to brood instead. Maybe it's the fact that the basic story track - the Kay-Kay/Kangna/Sharman mess at the heart of the film - comes straight from Billy Wilder's 1960 classic, The Apartment. Overall, it works.īut, there's something a bit jarring about it, something that doesn't go down too well. Metro is a crisp, smartly made film featuring a well-tuned ensemble cast and an appropriate soundtrack. Anurag Basu returns to the big screen with India's first well-crafted multi-narrative film, after more than a dozen directors have burnt their hands trying to go all Amores Perros on our unsuspecting audiences.