CITY OF GOLD

After a long search, I finally managed to find this movie online. It came in 4 parts of 100MB, uploaded on Rapidshare. Free download of such magnitude is restricted to 1 per day, hence I could download only 2 parts in the first 2 days. Somehow, I could not resist the temptation to find alternate sources to watch this movie. Eventually, I found out one (dailymotion) where the movie was uploaded for online viewing.


And what a movie it was!!! Very hard hitting and a authentic depiction of the real events that changed the face of my city for ever. In spite of reading so much about the Bombay Textile strike for so long and from so many different perspectives, it was very mind numbing to see the same story on celluloid. A gut wrenching saga which hits hard and hurts the mind.


And when I see movies like this (and Astitva, Viruddh) from Mahesh Manjrekar, I seriously wonder, why does his brain freeze while making other stupid movies. He has an incredible sense of the pulse when it comes to two genres -- gangster films and Maharashtrian background. All his successful films belong to either (or both) these two genres -- Vaastav, Astitva, Viruddh, this one. The Marathi viewer can instantly connect to such movies.


Anyone who is unaware of the background of the strike might find this movie boring. But anyone who is aware of the background of the strike will still find this movie hard hitting. And thats where the success of the director lies -- to surprise the viewer with the representation of an element that the viewer already knows very well. Not everyone is capable of doing it.


Having seen (just seen, not experienced) the life in such chawls on multiple occasions, I can very well relate to the origin of the sombre moods which are prevalent even today. It is so sad that the so called union leaders are politicians today (probably enjoying the fruits of power today), the mill owners are super rich and the common mill worker still languishes in the same 150 sqft homes, still waiting for the court cases to get resolved.


Yes, the strike was never called off. On paper, it is still going on, amidst this city of gold.