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Salaam Bombay! Special Edition [1988] [DVD]

Shafiq Syed , Hansa Vithal , Mira Nair    Suitable for 15 years and over   DVD
4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
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Product details

  • Actors: Shafiq Syed, Hansa Vithal, Chanda Sharma, Raghuvir Yadav
  • Directors: Mira Nair
  • Format: PAL
  • Language: Hindi
  • Subtitles: English
  • Region: Region 2 (This DVD may not be viewable outside Europe. Read more about DVD formats.)
  • Number of discs: 1
  • Classification: 15
  • Studio: Arrow Films
  • DVD Release Date: 23 Mar 2009
  • Run Time: 109 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
  • ASIN: B001P93F2U
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 10,620 in Film & TV (See Top 100 in Film & TV)

Reviews

From Amazon.co.uk

Meera Nair's Salaam Bombay was her first film, and one of only three Indian films nominated for an Oscar (the others being Mother India and Lagaan). The deceptively simple documentary style hides a meticulously planned feature in which nothing is left to chance. Real street kids play the leads alongside veteran actors, such as Nana Patekar and Shaukat Azmi, as we follow Chaipau, the urchin who wants to save his 500 rupees to "go home", and his encounters with prostitutes, thugs and drug addicts among whom he finds love and companionship. The story avoids sentimentality by endowing the characters with humanity while never romanticising their plight.

Nair eschews the obvious "city of contrasts" theme, presenting only the view from the street, shooting in real locations of Grant Road and its environs. This is one of the greatest presentations of Bombay to date, comparable across genres to Raghu Rai's photography or Vikram Chandra's fiction.

On the DVD: Salaam Bombay on DVD includes a compelling scene-by-scene commentary, in which Nair discusses the problems of location shooting, training the children and the impact of the film on the lives of so many of its characters. The film is in Hindi with English subtitles. --Rachel Dwyer

Product Description

Fed up with being continuously bullied by his elder brother, Krishna sets fire to his brother's motor-bike, which lands him in big trouble with his mother. She takes him to the nearby Apollo Circus and tells him that he can only come home when he earns 500 rupees to pay for the damaged bike. Krishna agrees and finds a job with the circus, but one day his boss asks him to run an errand and when Krishna returns, he finds that the circus has packed up and left. Alone and with nowhere to turn, and unable to find the money to repay his mother, he decides to travel to the nearest big city - Mumbai (Bombay). As soon as he arrives, he is robbed of all his meager possessions. He follows the thieves and befriends them, and ends up in the city's notorious red-light area of Falkland Road, near the Grant Road Railway Station. One of the thieves, Chillum, also a drug pusher and addict, helps Krishna get a job at the "Grant Road Tea Stall." Krishna gets a new name, "Chaipau," and learns to live with it. His goal is to get the money he needs to return home to his mother, but he soon finds out that saving money in his surroundings with the people near him is next to impossible. To make matters worse, he has a crush on a young prostitute named Sola Saal. He sets fire to her room and attempts to escape with her, but the two are caught. This gets Krishna a severe beating, and he loses his job. He works odd jobs to feed himself and look after Chillum, who can't live without his drugs. To get more money, Krishna and his pals rob an elderly Parsi man by breaking into his house in broad daylight. One night while returning home, the boys are apprehended by the police and taken to a juvenile home. Eventually, Krishna escapes and goes back to his world of drug-pushers, pimps and prostitutes, still nurturing his dream of one day returning to his mother.

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4.9 out of 5 stars
4.9 out of 5 stars
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
This is an amazing film which highlights the desperation of many children living in poverty in India. Mixing themes of prostitution, crime and poverty, the film invokes deep sympathy and concern from even the most hard hearted of viewers. Seen from the eyes of a young boy, the infamous 'chiller room' scene will definitely make you cry. A must see - this film moves away from the glitz of bollywood and shows the daily struggle of so many caught in the poverty trap
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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Life of Street Children in Bombay 13 Nov 2006
Format:DVD
Mira Nair shows the realities of living on the streets in Bombay where children sleep under bridges and sell tea to the prostitutes in brothels as they try to earn money to live from day to day ... Primarily, the film revolves around Krishna, a young boy of 11 years, who left his village to work on the streets of Bombay to earn 500 rupees to pay back his brother, whose bicycle he destroyed. He becomes part of a group of kids who hang out together and look out for one another ... They associate with drug dealers and prostitutes. While the film does show how drugs can destroy lives and how young innocent girls are lured into prostitution there is also a truthfulness and innocence which is conveyed ... The film depicts how the kids survive amidst poverty and how they manage to create a sustainable lifestyle with some semblance of happiness and a wonder for life despite having next to nothing in a material sense.

One of the best extra features on this DVD is the commentary by the director. Mira Nair provides insights into how many of the unique scenes were shot. She discusses particular angles and views used by the camera to capture the pure honesty of this lifestyle. She also describes difficulties encountered and how they were resolved, the major one was meeting the budget, the other was was getting big name actors and actresses for the key roles. Fortunately the subject matter was of such importance, a large British studio Filfour agreed to help fund the project if Ms Nair could raise 51% of the budget herself. Another plus was, the subject of the film was deemed a "governement film" and therefore she received funds as well as access to areas which otherwise would be denied, such as the children's home where street kids were taken after arrested. Ms Nair managed to get a popular male stage actor who had never done films to play one of the lead roles and to her delight, he has since become one of India's most famous leading male film actors. She also snared a popular female television soap opera star to play the female lead ...

One of the most unusual but appealing elements in this film is how Ms Mair used actual street children to be the key actors in the film. She held auditions and made selections then held seven week long workshops where they learned their parts via pictures of scenes which they memorized. Another captivating aspect of this film is how real streets with shop keepers and shoppers were filmed along with the real train station and the natural activities which fit the storyline of the film. This film is a magnificent study of a way of life that few people can imagine but it is all too common in poverty stricken areas of the world. Through this film, Mira Nair has brought the attention of the world to the plight of homeless children in India. She has made a great contribution to improving their lives on many levels. Due to her efforts, trusts have been established in Bombay and other major cities to educate and assist these children. The film itself is a mix of documentary and fiction which captures the intimate details of their reality in vivid color, detail, and honesty. This is a most highly recommended film. Erika Borsos {pepper flower}
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Audio CD
Composed by renowned South Indian recording artist L. Subramaniam, the "Salaam Bombay!" soundtrack features an invigorating blend of jazz and traditional Indian styles that serves to emotively embellish the movie's heart-wrenching tale. In fusing east with west in the plaintive and the frenetic, the work also manages to gloriously capture the spirit that defines the remarkable city that is Bombay. The album is not just distinguished though by its innovativeness or even its evocativeness, but also by the sheer brilliance of the musicianship on display. Track number 6 ["Chillum's Theme" - this song does not appear in its entirety in the motion picture], for instance, remains what is, in my opinion, one of the most incredible pieces of music to have graced my ears.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars Original Slumdog
I liked watching the additional material on this special edition showing how the film was made. It is Slumdog Millionaire without the glamour. Read more
Published 1 month ago by oldgrayfan
5.0 out of 5 stars Circle of misery
I cannot claim that you will feel quite content after watching this movie. Or beam with feelings of happiness or joy. Read more
Published on 16 Sep 2010 by Andries J. Hough
5.0 out of 5 stars Slumdog without Millionaire
Get a rather truer but no less engaging film on life in the Mumbai slums.
Published on 30 April 2009 by AD Matheson
5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant
Others have written excellent in depth reviews so ill keep mine short.

Firstly, watch it. Read more
Published on 27 April 2007 by Dan
5.0 out of 5 stars Shocking, real, touching, mind-provoking, artistic, documentary,...
In 1988 Mira Nair directed "Salaam Bombay" is a film about street children of Bombay. It's a story about a 10 year old boy Krishna (Shafiq Syed) who comes to Bombay from a small... Read more
Published on 17 Jun 2006 by A reader
4.0 out of 5 stars Plight of the Street Children at its depressing best
I saw this movie almost 18 years back while in college when i had not lived in bombay long enough to appreciate the setting for this movie. Read more
Published on 5 April 2006 by Anand Srinivasan
5.0 out of 5 stars Realistic and depressing
This is very far from a feel good film- in fact it's downright depressing. But then not everything in life is rosy. The film presents a struggle through poverty. Read more
Published on 30 Jun 2005 by John Newman
5.0 out of 5 stars Great realistic cinema
I too thought this film was wonderful & very moving. I loved the scene when Manju passed her 20 rupees to Shafiq after their gruelling days work. Read more
Published on 1 Oct 2003
5.0 out of 5 stars A FILM NOT SOON FORGOTTEN...
This is a superb film that gives the viewer a bird's eye view into the plight of India's urban street children. Read more
Published on 24 Nov 2002 by Lawyeraau
5.0 out of 5 stars An authentic, spell-binding, incendiary tour de force
"Salaam Bombay!" represents a quality and integrity in film-making that is all too hard to find elsewhere. Read more
Published on 5 Mar 2001
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