Taxi no 9 2 11 : Wada Paav

I am falling in love with the Ramesh Sippy Productions style of movie-making. Their movies are smart, thoughtful and entertaining. If Bluffmaster was Mumbai Udipi , then Taxi no. 9 2 11 is Wada Paav, juicy, spicy and churns your stomach a bit.

Nana Patekar, darling of many a Mumbaikar comes up with a performance that takes us back to his Krantiveer days. As a frustrated cabbie who has changed many jobs due to a distinct contempt for life and others, he is first rate and elevates the movie a notch. The rest of the cast barring Sonali Kulkarni is good wallpaper( especially Sameera with her expanding girth can cover a lot). The best part of the movie is that it has been entirely shot in Mumbai. The depiction of the chawl in which Nana and Sonali stay is so wonderfully realistic , I wonder if some chawls should be preserved before they fall prey to the bulldozers of Tarneja and Kaamdhandani.

Milan Luthria the director is back in form. His first movie Kacche Dhaage ( Ajay Devgan, Saif Ali Khan, Manisha, Namrata) was an interesting road movie and the altercations between Ajay ( a village stud) and Saif ( a yuppie) were good. He manages to carry that experience in the interactions with Nana and John ( a spoilt millionaire). Although John is no great actor, he has escaped the wooden touch that marks other models. Dialogues are pedestrianly Mumbai. Some sequences, the one at the police station and the one where Nana tells his son " Bat tera hai na. Fielding kyon karta hai. Tendulkar banne ka, Kaif nahi" are hilarious. But the humour is always situational. And the situations and characters seem straight out of Mumbai life. Thats where the movie scores.

The first half of the movie ends with Nana swearing vengeance when Sonali walks out when John tells her that her husband is not an LIC agent but a taxi driver. In the second half , Nana tries to wreck John's chances of getting his family property as his own family life crumbles.The scene where Nana comes to meet his son in school for the last time is touching. In trying to outdo each other they learn that their attitude to life is at fault rather than the other person. I thought the end was too tame , a sadistic end would have suited it more but that would not have ensured box-office success. Wohi finally bolta hai, Bombay ho ya Bhatinda.

Again Vishal and Shehar come up with a brilliant music score ( Dus, Salaam Namaste, Bluff Master, Zinda). They are on a roll. Traffic hai , kaha hai Bijuria, paise ki bazariya, Mumbai nagariya. A must see.