Life in a Metro

Life in a Metro

I saw two Anurag Basu movies almost back to back - Gangster and LIA Metro. I wish there was some way to put the best of these films together and make an awesome film. Gangster had a taut script and did not have as much disconnect as Metro, but Metro had some fine performances and great music. Metro is centered around an apartment that belongs to Rahul (Sharman Joshi) and he is happy to loan the keys to all and sundry for an edge up the career ladder. Sound familiar? Of course it should, there was a great film called The Apartment with exactly this theme where Jack Lemmon played the beleaguered employee who had to spend cold nights outside while his bosses "used" the apartment. And Rahul loves Neha (Kangana Ranaut) from afar only to find that she is one of the girls the boss Ranjeet (Kay Kay Menon) takes to the apartment. In the original this role of a vulnerable career girl was played by the incomparable Shirley McLaine and Kangana tries to channel her for all she is worth. Now to make his story original Mr. Basu flails about and adds on many other stories - Ranjeet has an ignored wife Shikha (Shilpa Shetty) who meets a man Akash (Shiny Ahuja) on a train/bus and starts to fall for him. Shikha's sister Shruti (Konkona Sen Sharma) shares an apartment with Neha and is pining for love to happen to her. After some Page 3 type mis-steps (date is gay) she falls for Monty (Irrfan Khan). Confused? Wait there is more - Shikha and Shruti's mom Shivani (Nafeesa Ali) meets up with her old flame Amol (Dharmendra) and he busts her out of some place she is not allowed to leave. So these pieces ebb and flow in the ocean that is Mumbai and we see a slice of working class life in the metro. Whenever there is a poignant moment there is a beautiful song that no main character sings. Instead we have a flea bitten trio of singers who do the honors. This is right out of Something about Mary - worked there, but here it is hokey to the extreme and the dudes are very annoying. They totally ruin the fine music in the film. Direction is okay I guess - there are some blood red moments when Shilpa is about to do the deed (will she?) - I felt like I was back in Black Friday. The film is very dark and moody and the cinematography is quite excellent. Now for the best part of Metro - the acting. In order of my preference - Kay Kay plays the cad husband and heartless boss very well. But why does he breakdown when he comes back home? Neha leaving him makes that profound a difference? That is just not believable, but his caddish behavior after Shikha confesses is spot on! Irrfan is awesome as the socially inept male who cannot keep his eyes on the right spot. His horse-ride is filmy but hilarious. Next up is Shaman Joshi - he has the best role and does an excellent job as the career guy who suffers the consequences of his own thoughtless actions. Konkona is competent - she does this job well but this is really not a meaty enough role for her. Same goes for Shiny - not much of a role, but well done. Shilpa is okay - I found her trying hard to express sorrow and remorse and happiness but not being very natural in her attempts. In that sense I felt that though Kangana played the same role yet again she was good in her role. However - she needs to improve her diction. And last but not least we have Nafeesa Ali and Dharmendra - I wish Anurag had chopped off a few of the inane bits and given us more of this duo - they tugged at your heart strings and were simply beautiful. Inexplicable why she dies and why she could not leave her "home" etc. but I did not care. So all in all I think Gangster (in spite of Emraan Hashmi) was a better flick - more focused and touching. But Metro is a decent watch for the ensemble cast that all perform well.

This is a typical and boring urban relationship drama (in that sense it's not really life in a metro, which has slums and markets, it's more like urban upper-middle class melodrama). On top of that a large part of the movie is lifted off the comedy classic The Apartment, and almost all the music is plagiarized too (see wiki). It's about several couples and singles having/considering/rethinking adultery, office space relationships, marriage, etc. Shilpa Shetty either lowered her eyes or cried throughout the whole movie so I couldn't get anything interesting from her character. Her husband was a rather flat mean-husband type, and the theater guy she was trying to get involved with was also very flat and remained facially expressionless throughout most of the movie. Dharmendra, who was great in Johnny Gaddaar, was totally boring here and he and his partner gave me no sense of their love or loss. The section with Kangna Ranaut was also very disappointing because firstly I saw that it was taken out of The Apartment, and secondly, it did not even hold a candle to its source material. If it matched/exceed/ or lived up to the Apartment I would have let it go (I think Zinda did that, as much as people disagree with me), but it was much inferior to it so the whole time I was busy comparing it to the Apartment instead of taking it for what it is. The only new thing I thought this movie brought in was Irfan Khan's character Monty, which was funny because of its accurate depiction of that uneducated, somewhat vulgar but still world-wise and affectionate person we all know. Too bad that subplot was diluted with all the other ones. It would have been a better movie if they have taken that subplot, since it is the only somewhat original one that movie has, and elaborated it enough for its own movie. Another weakness of the movie was the bad timing of the music-video where they show the rock band. Every time something emotional or dramatic was happening, they cut to closeups of the grungy-faced rockers. The whole tone and mood totally dissolved. So the low score because: it's nothing new, and not only is it not new, several parts and songs are lifted straight off of foreign sources. I've seen thousands of movies, and nothing is more boring than unintentionally seeing a repeat.

Firstly, the casting of the film (Shiny Ahuja, Irfan Khan, Kay Kay and Konkona Sen) all are great! Most people have seen Murder - it was well directed so I was expecting something good. The movie is about these characters mentioned above who are somehow related to each other (work, family, and etc) which certainly helps. There are many characters, many stories going on but the part that makes it easier to understand their feelings or issues in life is that everyone is in a similar boat. Either someone's marriage isn't working, everyone trying to advance in a corporate business world, love is gone between relationships, need someone new for sex or etc (hopefully you get the point) One common theme was loneliness in a big city - things appear to be different from inside - everyone has a secret type of thing. The importance on the society image also plays a vital role. An important and a key element to this film is the caliber of actors. They all do a great job. Perfect casting! I don't always like Shilpa - but she did a good job as well. Irfan Khan & Konkona Sen really stand out, get ample scope and do deliver. I like the band and the placement of the background score/songs. When they appear (almost reminds you a bit of there is something about mary (movie) (I think...haha) The director really captured Mumbai well. Great camera work and the sets - nice ambiance. Overall a good movie experience. Worth watching once for sure. 8/10

Metro tells the story of a set of interconnected characters -- each one drawn in detail and seemingly real -- a rarity in Indian cinema. You can practically identify the characters as your neighbor, boss, friend etc. Anurag Basu's direction has become increasingly confident with every release, and this is his best feature yet. Metro is moodily lit and shot, and the music by Pritam bleeds into the narrative in an uncommon fashion. Yes, the appearance of the singers gets boring ultimately, but the songs themselves tie the narrative threads impressively well. The performances are of the highest order -- not a bad turn in the bunch. "Best in show" honors go to, not surprisingly, Irrfan Khan and Konkona Sen Sharma (they also have the most interesting story line). Kay Kay Menon continues his excellent work in films, Dharmendra and Nafisa Ali are superb in their slightly under-written story arc and Kangana Ranaut may be reprising the same role over and over again, but she seems to carry it off in a way I cannot imagine any other actress doing. The revelations, if any, should be Shilpa Shetty and Sharman Joshi - each turning in their career best work. The end is a little hokey and very filmy, but most of this film works rather well. 3.5 out of 5 stars

i just came back after seeing the movie and couldn't help writing something (good) about it. after a series of disappointing Hindi and a few English (spiderman 3)this one was totally refreshing. but as i logged on to the site i saw someone saying that it seemed like a half hearted effort to him. firstly, he seemed to have been too influenced with the sharman joshi n the apartment bit. that was only a small part of the film n not the main story. i agree to his viewpoint that some of these stories did seem familiar and seen before but i would say that they were handled and presented in a much better way in this movie. secondly, most of the Indian directors fail to manage parallel stories like this one but it's been done sensitively here. the movie has it's weak points too, but VERY few. all the characters were well defined, no extra footage to anyone in particular, the story has a few unpredictable sequences and YES the horse on the roads of mumbai was dramatic but haven't we grown up seeing just all of this in most of the other Hindi movies. at least it was done in a more fun way. not to mention that konkona was immense! (does she ever do any bad movies???) irrfan khan was fantastic, shilpa shetty wasn't too bad as well. i really liked gangster and unlike the other first-time-wonder directors, anurag basu does a fantastic job the second time around. it's totally watchable and love irfan n konkona's chemistry!!!

Just back from seeing the first preview at Cineworld, Tracadero, London - along with 3 other people at the 11am showing. ( One walked out after the first hour) Although traditionally Bollywood films are 3 hour plus, this one comes in at 2 and a quarter hours. The songs performed by a band, did get on my nerves after the third song, and there are far too any characters in the film. Also the Shilpa Shetty storyline, is exactly the same as Brief Encounter, and yet no reference to that said great movie was made. And why oh why does Shilpa have a picture of Anne Robinson in her lounge. Oh yes, and you can spot the gay character a mile off as he has a poster of Brokeback Mountain in his office.. All that said, it is an enjoyable romp, totally forgettable after you leave the cinema.

With one movie, Anurag Basu rose quite high in my books as a director to look out for. Gangster was in many ways a complete movie for an Indian Movie audience and one of the best features of last year. Expectantly, Life in a... Metro was highly anticipated, especially with the movie repeating most of Basu cast & crew and a few more welcome actors. Basu sits right on top of the breed of Bhatt-nurtured directors who, if nothing else, have always made movies distinctly different from regular Bollywood fare. Life in a... Metro is an amalgamation of six stories between nine characters from one suburb. These stories entwine and intersect at various points to portray personal lives for regular middle-class suburb dwellers. Passion, Sex, Loyalty, Romance, Lust, Stress and Love become the underlying themes woven into the fabric of the movie. Basu is not in top form here, but this could be more due to constraints of mainstream Bollywood. Visibly a bigger and a more conformist producer like UTV (Ronnie Screwwala) is not as liberal as the Bhatts with Basu. Melodrama and formula somehow creep in and take over the final act of the movie in a complete departure of style from the rest of the movie. Apart from this major gripe, Basu deftly handles interspersing between stories and fleshing out his characters. Adultery becomes a major theme in most of the stories, but moral questions are not raised and neither ignored. Events are simply depicted "as is", letting the viewer judge for him/herself of their moral implications. That extra-marital affairs and sex-for-favors exist is taken as fact rather than implied, taboo'd or endorsed. Rather, the effect of it on individuals is depicted differently and quite aptly. Among the troupe of (mostly) wonderful actors, Kay Kay Menon thunders ahead portraying a selfish and chauvinistic husband and boss. Any scenes with him are the highlights of the movie proving again beyond doubt how wonderful an actor he is, regardless of the character he plays. Yet, for the genuinety of him you are left wanting to see more of him on screen than the limited screen time the director could afford. Complementing him in a parallel story is Irrfan, an equally gifted actor, playing a passionate and philosophical middle-age single guy looking for an ideal wife through matrimonial ads. Sprinkle around them a host of characters to support their stories, and you have a wonderful ensemble that is as true to the setup of the movie as any. Shiny Ahuja and Kanga Ranaut play easy parts but their talents are used only to a minimum. Dharmendra, Nafisa Ali, Sharman Joshi and Konkona Sen Sharma play regulars. Exception: Shilpa Shetty. Her character and performance are so out of this movie that you wonder if she walked into the wrong movie set with a different script. Shamelessly flaunting her star status and new-found celebrity, she proves yet again that being and "Actor" and a "Movie Star" are not mutually inclusive. Basu's association with Pritam continues to produce some really good music. The movie's music is more of a soundtrack with a single musical theme in all the tracks. Basu also has the three-member band appear throughout the movie inbetween and during scenes. These band members are part of the crowd, or drifters singing the tracks that are sprinkled through the movie. A high-end concept for Indian Cinema, and one that works for me completely. Although the climax reaches levels of extreme campyness, it is easy to forgive the director for the battle he fights with only a few others on his side against Bollywood conventionalism. Yet, after the powerful Gangster, Basu's latest is a step down. For his and our sake, I wish him back to the Bhatts. My Rating --> 3.5 of 5

This is a good blend of lives of different kinds of people staying in a metro and the conditions and situations they come across. The story is interwoven with different characters related to each other and takes care of all kinds of people not to miss any kind of character that is found in a metro. It is sensitive at times but entertaining. The plot is so nicely woven that you would be in touch with each and every character. The songs are also good and situational. Finally the end being really very crucial and the situations that come up treat everybody in a very practical way to manage everything and you wont feel it unrealistic because the directors and the script writers have done their job.... In short, once watchable, worth spending few hours for entertainment. I hope everybody enjoys......

Telling parallel stories inter-related to various degrees had been the flavor for some time now in Hindi cinema. Success, however, is almost absent. Anurag Basu had almost pulled it off except for three things - incorrect branding, lack of originality and wannabe rock stars showing up everywhere. The story as such had nothing to do with the city of Mumbai. It could have been set anywhere. Also how the city adds to the plights and joys of the character is not very clear. Rat race, lack of time for family, sexual confusions/frustrations are all a reality today of even mid-range cities, not only metros. This is what I meant by incorrect branding. I think the film should have been promoted as story of the time we live in, irrespective of the city. It would have appealed to a larger audience base. Basu has been liberal in copying the classic 'The Apartment'. You cannot copy a classic just like that. I'm not sure if the makers of 'The Apartment' are at least credited. Originality is the biggest virtue of any art. Then, the rock stars. Pritam and his band were omnipresent throughout the film. The songs are fantastic but they popping up everywhere started to irritate very soon. A more imaginative filming of the songs would have added to the film's value. Inspite of all this, Metro is a very good film to come out in recent times. Though Basu does not go deep into the torments of the characters and just touches them fleetingly, he does manage to capture the essence. Casting is almost precise and all actors do a good job. You get the import of the film that how we are losing ourselves in the maze of the paths laid down for us by everyone except ourselves. It is hard to stand up and reclaim your life. It is difficult to open the car's door and walk out like Kangana does at the end, but probably that's what most of us want to do most of the time.