Anurag Basu’s latest, Metro… In Dino is very much of a piece with his previous work. With each successive movie, particularly since Life in a… Metro (which is this film’s spiritual predecessor) in 2007, Basu has grown more confident in his idiosyncrasies, more expressive of his tastes, and less concerned with whether we can keep up with him.
Many elements from his past work recur joyfully here: the hyperlink cinema format, with multiple intersecting storylines; the overflowing, melodious music; the live band (Pritam, Papon, and Raghav Chaitanya); the character named Shruti (here played by Fatima Sana Shaikh); the colour-pop cinematography (courtesy Basu himself and Abhishek Basu); and the pouring rain.
In other words, if the teeming cast of Ludo confused you, or if the unnamed passionate musicians of Life in a… Metro bored you, or if the sung dialogue of (the criminally underrated) Jagga Jasoos irritated you—then Metro… In Dino is not for you.
But for the rest of us, it’s another chance to watch the new manic musical madness Basu’s brain has dreamt up. (The screenplay is by Basu, with dialogues by Samrat Chakraborty and Sandeep Shrivastava.)
‘Metro… In Dino’ Is a Symphony of Cities
As a follow-up to Life in a… Metro, which was set in a rain-drenched Mumbai, the canvas here has widened to include rain-drenched Delhi, Kolkata, Pune, and Goa as well. Characters flit nimbly between the cities. If one minute, Pritam’s band is crooning at Kala Ghoda, then the next we are in Connaught Place with Parth (Aditya Roy Kapur) and Chumki (Sara Ali Khan in a wig that doesn’t always fit but somehow still suits her).
Chumki’s parents, Shivani (a beautifully affecting Neena Gupta) and Sanjeev (Saswata Chatterjee), live in Pune. Chumki’s sister Kajol (Konkona Sen Sharma) lives in Mumbai with her daughter and her husband Monty (Pankaj Tripathi)—unsurprisingly delightful—and what a treat to watch him dance and lip sync! Parth’s college friends are the couple Shruti (Shaikh) and Akash (Ali Fazal), who live in Bengaluru but later relocate to Mumbai and Delhi. And finally, Parimal (Anupam Kher) lives in Kolkata with Jhunuk (Darshana Banik).
This last storyline, of Parimal and Jhunuk, is perhaps most emblematic of Basu’s laidback writing style. The two characters are introduced at the same time as everyone else—in the first of the film’s stunning musical sequences, reminiscent of the opening stretch of Salaam-e-Ishq, which also had a bustling cast—and they recur through the first half, but it is only well past interval that we actually learn anything about them.
Putting us through half the movie without telling us the first thing about two primary characters is quite an audacious writing choice, but since it is done with confidence and flair, the payoff is worth it.
Humour, Music and Crackling Performances
The first hour or so of Metro… In Dino is an unqualified joy. Once we are tuned into the film’s frequency, there is always the anticipation of an expertly crafted song sequence, or a crisp and warmly funny line of dialogue. For instance, Monty says of his girlfriends before Kajol that none of their hands really fit in his, as hers does—such a sweetly poetic image!
Humour buoys the film and there is no self-importance here: watch for Basu’s cameo—at a urinal!
The performances are all worth watching. Khan, ordinarily given to contorting her face and gesticulating wildly, finally finds herself in a film that allows her just to be. Roy Kapur is also most endearing, all nerdy glasses and laidback charm. Shaikh is impressive, and she and Fazal work well together in the film’s most fraught storyline.
Sen Sharma, perhaps taking a cue from the actress who is her character’s namesake, leans into Kajol’s loud tendencies, but is never less than watchable.
And stringing it all together is the music. Pritam’s moony, impassioned rock ballads come and go, as the live band are always a stone’s throw from our protagonists. But when songs leak into scenes and characters begin to lip-sync, with dialogue emerging seamlessly into lyrics—these sequences are charged with the pulsing bliss only a film song can give.
The editing (by Bodhaditya Banerjee) is so sparkling and smooth that these sequences seem almost made of air. Particularly memorable is a group number in a café, where three of the protagonists gather to pretend they are happy. Many of these Broadway-style numbers have not been released yet, but since the official soundtrack has been labelled ‘Side A’, perhaps we can expect them in the coming weeks.
A Loosening Post-Interval
Post-interval, though, several of the storylines—which had so far been quirky or funny or poignant—begin to take oddball or protracted turns. As Kajol and Monty’s marriage begins to splinter, we find ourselves on an extended holiday in Goa, where Kajol finds a lust-interest in a character played by the dreamy Rohan Gurbaxani, but these bits wobble questionably between comedy and drama.
Meanwhile Shruti and Akash’s story goes round and round in dizzying and aimless circles—at one point, Shruti, who had moved to Delhi for work, simply shows up in Mumbai and stays for days. How much leave does she have? There is a man at her news reporting job who seems poised to become a romantic dalliance, but he is later forgotten.
In this second half, the older characters also get more screen time, when Shivani travels to Kolkata for a college reunion and runs into Parimal, who was her classmate. As Parimal’s relationship with Jhunuk is revealed (another magic group number), and Shivani is shoehorned into this story, it begins to get more and more absurd.
Basu tries to make a very tragic point about breaking relationships as opposed to maintaining them, but getting there is—as Shivani herself puts it—bizarre.
The Circle of Life
Yet, even amongst these stories taking a downward spiral, there continue to be enchanting moments of levity, melody and character development. I enjoyed the subplot involving Kajol and Monty’s daughter, a teen who is grappling with her sexuality, which is handled with care and affection. Or this winning line Parimal says of Shivani: ‘Jhurriyaan aa gayeen, par sharaaraten naheen gayeen’ (You’ve got wrinkles, but you haven’t lost your mischief).
Or even the increasingly apparent throwbacks to Life in a… Metro, which move beyond simple winking references (such as the names Shivani, Shruti, Akash and Monty) and begin to quietly underline Basu’s overarching pondering about the circle of life.
The climax—whose melodrama possesses a pleasing vitality—includes a young woman hilariously confessing her love for a man at his wedding, just as the original Shruti did for the original Monty- that Monty was played by Irrfan; this film opens with a message remembering him.
By the end of Metro… In Dino, a few of the couples have swapped places as problems assailing some of them at the beginning now assail others. And we are left with endings, but not easy, pat ones.
Where will these men and women go? We don’t know, it isn’t important. There is a sense of temporary quiet, before the endless churning of life begins again.
(Sahir Avik D'souza is a writer based in Mumbai. His work has been published by Film Companion, TimeOut, The Indian Express, and EPW. He is an editorial assistant at Marg Magazine.)