A very un-Indian, un-Bollywood movie, neck deep in a subject that Indian films rarely touch. Since I don't deal with spoilers in this blog I'd refrain from mentioning the subject. If you know the theme, the movie will unravel faster than you can say "Shazam". Even without any spoiler I had it figured out(did the director intend it that way?) and thus the end was less of a shocker for me than it was to Kalki Koechlin who plays the protagonist, Ruth.Kalki has a really meaty role for an actress. She cannot help it if the film is being directed by her boyfriend-turned husband director Anurag Kashyap. The entire movie, shot in 13 days on a borrowed wallet concentrates on Ruth's personal quest for something very near and dear to her while surviving as a young white girl in the dirty underbelly of Mumbai.
There are a lot irrelevant roles. Some of these roles like that of Ruth's junkie boyfriend and the Kannada speaking Mumbai dada Chittiappa can be taken as cinematic liberties to add texture to the plot. I do not understand what Ronit Roy, who is given a scene and a sentence to speak and Rajat Kapoor - no sentences, just gets a passing glance at Ruth, walking by her by at the entrance of an apartment, are doing in the film.
Definitely a movie for mature audience. So mature that many people who lent money to make the film asked to have their names removed from the credits as they were not liberal enough to be associated with such a progressive film. The film released in non-NRI theaters in the US the same day it had its Indian release through the same US distributor, must be a first for an Indian movie?
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