Mumbai Express (2005)

Director:

Singeetham Srinivasa Rao

Writers:

Kamal Hassan (Tamil dialogue)
Kamal Hassan (story)

Release Date:

15 April 2005 (India)

Genre:

Comedy

Plot:

After having spent his entire life in Bombay's Dharavi slums, Digamber feels it is time that he takes steps to improve his lifestyle...

Plot Keywords:

Deaf | Child Kidnapping | Car Crash | City Name In Title | Stuntman

Cast

Kamal Hassan	...	Avinash / Mumbai Express
Manisha Koirala	...	Ahilya
Pasupathy	...	Chittambaran (Tamil Version)
Nasser	...	Police Inspector (Tamil Version)
Om Puri	...	ACP S.P. Rao (Hindi version)
Vaiyapuri	...	Johnson (Tamil version)
Ramesh Aravind	...	Thambu, insurance agent
Dinesh Lamba	...	Johnson (Hindi Version)
Vijay Raaz	...	Digambar (Hindi Version)
Sharat Saxena	...	Inspector Saxena
Santhana Bharathi	...	(Tamil version)
Saurabh Shukla	...	Kishore Mehta (Hindi Version)
Dheena Chandra Dhas	...	Raju (as Dheena)
Hardik Thakkar	...	Daddu
Pratima Kazmi	...	Durga, Avinash's sister (Hindi Version)

Also Known As:

Mumbai Xpress (International: English title)

Runtime:

152 min

Country:

India

Language:

Hindi | Tamil

Color:

Color

Certification:

India:A | India:UA (cut) | Malaysia:U | UK:PG

Company:

Raajkamal Films International

One of those Kamal's not so good movies

I am sorry. Let me be very frank, if you are looking for Kamal's acting or pasupathy's performance like in Virumandi, then please avoid this movie. But if you want to laugh your heart out and forget the story, logic etc etc then please do go to this movie.

Movie as a whole has very weak plot, Kamal looks like was not really sure how he wanted to end the movie and what message he wanted to give. The story goes like this, Chidambaram (Pashupathy) and his two friends - codenamed B and C -make a plan to kidnap the son of a rich builder. They discuss their foolproof plan sitting at their adda in Mumbai's Dharavi.

But there comes the first problem in whole problematic kidnapping Episode. - C is rushed for an appendicitis operation. A (Chidhambaram, of course!) and B are stopped by C's wife from abandoning the plan and further recommends her much talented brother Mumbai Xpress in place of her husband.

Avinashi (Kamal Haasan), who is deaf, (Mumbai Xpress is only a nickname as , if you're wondering). Xpress jinxes the endeavour and a series of unfortunate events like horse bites, car crashes and accidents ensue. Eventually, Avinash manages to kidnap a boy but he is not the boy. Their starts the whole confusion for us as well as for the director. He was not sure how to take the movie further put everyone including the audiences in a tight spin.

I kept wondering, did he wanted to say that father(or parental patronage) is very important to a boy/child, or did he wanted to stress all the women like is bundles and bundles of money or did he wanted to say following the 'straight path' is good in life. Keep guessing it. Some of the picturisation especially at the Slum shots with over head aircrafts flying was damn good.

My best scene is the School prayer scene where the children who watches Kamal and play the song with expression of emotions while he tries to climb the rope, it was a real good idea. I think Kamal is one of those few good directors who can think of such peculiar but reality situations.

But still my sincere suggestion to Kamal would be to go back to Western movies and adopt some stories like he did earlier and give us a new tamil Movie.