Mumbai Salsa, while watching, the first thing that came into my mind was …. the Indian Cinema really moved ahead and specially last few weeks going so so special for the same. Jhonny Gaddar, Dil Dosti Etc., Bhool Bhulaiya, Laga Chunri Mein Daag, No Smoking, Jab We Met, Speed …. Really lots of good movies and a few which I personally rate as best out of rest are Dil Dosti Etc., No Smoking and Mumbai Salsa, quite of different taste … that’s why I am up to writing review over the third one (hoping that even this time, will keep it short).

The first comment of mine, which may come to define the movie is its being Dil Chahta Hai GenNext. But now, it was more precise, detailing and with lots more space to female side as well. For the people, knowing about US Series “Friends” (Of course, the target audience knows), its really like Indian Version of something similar. It was really all about a class. Must see… Its really surprising that Metro Centric movies are so frequent in now days.

Why “Mumbai Salsa”? Movie starts with talking about schools which might have seen lots of stories of success and failures; of marriage halls, who might have seen lots of couple wedding under them; of courts, where some of marriages come to an end; and then Lounge/ Pub/ Disco/ Night Club/ Bar. It starts with a question that where this place stands for someone’s life? What role this place plays in now days Metro lives? Is it really loosening morals in lives or just GenNext, which knows how to live and how to succeed in everything? Lots of things and you will feel questions and answers from inside you, if you have been somewhere near it. I should say that Mumbai Salsa.. is not everyone’s idea of entertainment. Its really really about a class.

Director, Screenplay, Dialogues, Story: Manoj Tyagi (scripted Page 3, Satta, Apaharan etc.)
Cost: Indraneil, Dilip Tadeshwar, Vir Das, Neelam, Rheyy, Linda Arsenio, Manjiri, Amruta Kanvilkar.
Lyrics: Sameer, Adnan Sami.
Music Director: Adnan Sami

This is a movie about well settled youth, well earning, highly intellectual, well educated and living lives on their own. In terms, a movie targeting Multiplexes and Metro lives as per now days happening trends. This is a movie about eight persons; Subbu, Pamela, Maya, Rajeev, Karan, Xenobia, Shahji and Neha. Each one representing distinct way of thinking, distinct way of looking at things and distinct way of defining things, you could come up with the side of anyone of them and so they look so real, so touchy and so much of between us.

Subbu: He works for a big advertising company and definitely must be good enough at work as he came to be youngest vice president of the company. He really represents that side of boys, who hails  from middle class cities and came to be part of Metro Life style, got succeed, earning well, even got adjusted in Metro’s life style to some extent, but still their moral, traditions make them out of sync from many things. For these boys, things like seeing someone is fine, but things kind of one night stand is a totally absurd idea. They could, themselves might not be very precise over their sides/ views, but ready to raise voice even if in not that confident manner (infact orthodox manner). You see his loosing side, when in argument with Pamela over Lingerie Campaign, we see him loosing words… we see him loosing, when he come to show anger uselessly over Pamela without any reason. Was he angry over short cloths or over-enthusiasm.

Where he is? What he might be thinking? Why he is like this? You think him as not that important side of the movie, but in fact, he is the one, who connect with most of the audience. People, who don’t have enough words to counter arguments coming from modern lifestyle to completely deny them. They might being called as ancient and outdated, but want to keep on protesting as don’t want to loose their morals in flow of Metro lifestyle. He gets angry over Pamela uselessly, even when he loves her from inside, because his idea of girl is just something different. Someone cute, beautiful, confident and high on morals and traditions. He gets impressed from Pamela, but her supporting his other colleagues over now days youth’s ‘American Take’ irritates him all the times.

Do you know, this part of society will come to argue over these kind of movies.

Pamela: Typical sensitive US girl, who feels emotionally attached with Indian Traditions and so with Subbu, but at the same time find herself much confused with his ways, when get to see everyone else going on typical practical ways, but Subbu just out of rest. Probably that being out of rest invites her more. Subbu come to be like a challenge to her. About him, she always knows that she could make him fall for her, but still missing that hit.

Rajeev: Someone a bit better adjusted in Metro-Corporate-Indian-Youth Culture than Subbu, means never orthodox like him and always ready to change and accommodate according to need and society but from the heart, innocent like kids and cares about everyone and everything. This starts with her girlfriend Pooja dumping her over her career’s demands-n-‘practical approach of life’ and then in an unconventional way, finds himself into an One Night Sit with a stranger girl (Maya), whose name was not known to him. Earning 30 lacs per anum!!!!! Just think … Mumbai Salsa’s story is not everyone’s cake, but still connects with Metro-Corporate-Indian-Youth. Her traditional man come out once to say “Husband is the bread winner of family”, but still he is responsible and loving enough. For Pooja, he gets permanent Tatoo of her name on his hands and for the other means Maya, he leaves his jobs, current one of 30lacs and next one of 60 lacs. Someone, like whom, one would like to be and so in a way, he is part of the lead pair in this movie. His late ‘What’ syle… come to be trade mark of him and also makes his persona described.

Maya: The girl to take part of lead pair. The story in a way revolves around Maya-Rajeev pair, which starts in an unconventional way with a Night Sit (?) between them. Yeah not a night stand, but night sit, how come it is? You have to see. You see the word pseudo-intellectual used twice for Maya in the same movie, once by Sanjay, who dumped her and then by Subbu. Was that right? or its just being herself proud of her achievements against will of her family and Men’s world. After being dumped by her boyfriend Sanjay, when she was so much humiliated then in that state of mind, she came to meet a simple guy and the story starts from here. She represents a normal, sensitive, optimistic, dominating and career oriented girl, who want to live with own terms, with high morality and without any compromise in any place, not even in relations. Is she right? Does being herself always more important than the relationship? She has already got so many breakups. The story starts from this point and gets a high, when for feeling herself the winner, she touched ‘even more heights’ than the night sit. The story ends at a point, where she come to realize that its not the winning, which is always important, but its being happy in life is.

Karan: A normal handsome flirt, for whom, the love life doesn’t get a full stop after the marriage. He know that he could get girls even after being married, if girls don’t know about the same and so he goes like that. He is presenting Metro-Corporate-Indian-Youth Culture in a perfect and decent way. You might not agree with the same but its like that and I have seen its happening all around us. He used to have perfect ideas to make a girl fall for him, learns Salsa to get Xenobia impressed and soon he got chances to enter into Xenobia’s mind. It was once his game and usual ways and then come to be his deep emotional attachment and guilt feelings. We see him, when he says that when we again will over some add campaign like this lingerie one, then will look back that what were those days last time.. so I wanted to live the life at its fullest. We see him from inside, when he says like some confident that “forget about all that man, let’s go somewhere and get drunk” and then suddenly broke down in tears saying that he has screwed his life himself. He says that his only mistake was to love two girls at a time. Was he justified? You might have not seen someone like him in your life, but you still know that there are Karans around us.

Xenobia: Xenobia, probably the least covered in this movie from the eight lead characters. Like others, an intelligent girl, who is single and a flirt (Karan) makes his chances so easily for the conversation at least. She has a brother, who asks for money only, otherwise no relation at all and kept herself busy with sometimes Neha’s ultra-unconventional life and sometimes with Salsa classes. She came in arms of Karan, when he shows his sensitiveness by coming in between her brother and then taking her worries away by the only thing she loves from the heart, the dance ‘Salsa’. She gets a nervous breakdown, when come to know about the fact that Karan is married. At the end, she comes to decide to live her life alone with her Mumbai Salsa.

Shahji: Like he says, he is an open book and nothing to hide. He don’t think in terms of morality. Like to enjoy the life at its fullest and he define it in terms of having girls in bed and he gets a match like Neha. Thanks God, he has some friends like Karan, Subbu and Rajeev, which kept the good person alive in him, which finally spoke, when asks Neha that why she is spreading permanence around, when even in her life nothing is permanent. We have lots like Shahji, but does all of them gets their happy endings? They could, if they still have a pure heart from somewhere inside and a better luck to have good stories around them.

Neha: The most unconventional character for conventional Indians. Maya calls her Nymphomaniac and in reply she calls herself as Hyper-Sexual. Love to get in bed with any passer-by and with Shahji, his conversation started in a way, “Are you good in bed?”. That’s our Neha. Unfortunately, even I was not able to find the true Neha before Shahji and when Shahji finds her in that way and proposes her for marriage this time, then we come to see just another Neha and their part story ends here with their happy marriage.

The movie ends with the note that why people come here (Mumbai Salsa)?
For forgetting their worries, to de-stress or to escape everyday problems, problems of life, but when these problems gets solved, then … then Mumbai Salsa still continues as there will be always some Subbu, Pamela, Maya, Rajeev, Karan, Xenobia, Shahji or Neha, who will kept on coming here to make new stories and Mumbai Salsa will continue to say … “Come on people ….. let’s do the Mumbai Salsa”

So, the Mumbai Salsa ends here with three couples living happily like ever after and rest two get left to stay alone. I know that almost everyone like me and my working professional friends would be able to relate themselves with at least one character of this movie. Go and watch… don’t wait for reviews… don’t make assumptions … its one of the best.