JioCinema has released Santosh Sivan’s flick.
Mumbaikar, directed by Santosh Sivan, is a throwback to the city-set ensemble picture, in which dissimilar individuals are pushed together by chance and the screenwriter’s ingenuity. It’s the kind of film where Mumbai is reduced to a handful of streets, where every character, regardless of economic position, can be seen drinking in the same pub, and where everyone continues running into everyone else just by turning the corner.
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The screenplay by Himanshu Singh weaves together the storylines of a young job seeker (Hridhu Haroon), the friendly manager who interviews him (Tanya Maniktala), and her proudly unemployed admirer (Vikrant Massey). Their paths cross with a criminal (Ranvir Shorey) who wears sparkling shirts and eats vada pao to prove his local credentials, a group of aspiring kidnappers, a driver (Sanjay Mishra), and a police officer (Sachin Khedekar).
Fortunately for Mumbaikars, there is also Vijay Sethupathi’s good-natured Tamilian, who has wandered into the megacity with mafia ambitions. The most endearing aspect of this outmoded, usually meaningless, and enervating exercise is Sethupathi’s cheeky Manu, who rapidly picked up the Mumbai trick of fake it till you make it.
Santosh Sivan, who also directed the picture, chooses a jagged, unexpectedly simple visual approach, with scenes lasting only a few seconds and a camera always on the move, not knowing where to go. The primary thesis of the 123-minute film – that mistaken identity can lead to a happy chance – never arrives, being overshadowed by boring reflections on what it means to be a Mumbai inhabitant.
