Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

AnhartLinkin This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Raymond Sierra The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

dbhattac I myself was a victim of Hindu Muslim riot while living in Dhaka and this film reminded me in vivid details of what happens in real life during a communal riot. The film is a masterpiece in a sense that conflict between and muslims in India is so prevalent and common occurrence and for all these years with hundreds of movies made I have finally found one that dealt with this issue in real terms. The story is about Shekhar Mishra ( Arvind Swamy ) falling in love with Shaila Bano ( Monisha Koirala ) a Muslim girl and eventually marrying her without the blessing of their parents on both sides. They settle in Bombay where Shekhar works as reporter and have twin boys. The story is written in the backdrop of the Auyodha mosque attack during the 1990's and a communal riots breaks out. The director Mani Ratnam has handled the story very well with realistic scenes of the riot with the burning of vehicles and rampant killing on the streets as well as the chaos and confusion of the people and the government. Both Arvind Swamy and Monisha Koirala gave commendable performance in the two leading roles with good support from the others. The music and cinematography is above average. This is a good film to watch . I gave it a nine out of ten.

Alex Chambers When you mention the words 'Indian cinema' to most people, (and disturbingly, a large proportion of film fans) often the first reaction will be that of a smirk intrinsically linked with a conjuring thought of the 'Bollywood' industry.Most people do not realise that Indian cinema as an industry is the second largest grossing cinema industry in the world, second only to the American giant that is Hollywood. Ever since the early days of the multiplex, Indian cinema has been dominating the cinematic machine, early films often dealt with social and economic strikes (mostly the 50's and before) with the Indian cinema moving more towards the romantic feature which most people associate in the mid 60's. As the decades passed by, the Indian film industry moved, as a whole, through several topics and thought provoking genres (of course a LOT of crap was released as well; this is the typical all singing all dancing 5 hour epic which most people associate Indian cinema with) until in the 90's, film makers finally started focusing on terrorism as a genre, and in particular the strife and violence engaged between Hindus and Muslims within the Tamil speaking area of India.Bombay begins as your typical Indian romance; the protagonist male and female fall in love yet are separated by different religions and families. After a moving Eden like opening song number, the two work hard to stay together through their families approval, eventually moving away form their small villages and into the city of Bombay.After an interval, the film takes a much darker tone, focusing primarily on the Bombay bombings and showing how the couple (now with children) are caught up within the racial attacks. Strikingly disturbing and realistic (one scene involves radicals pouring gasoline over the two crying children as they refuse to speak which religion they belong to) the film touches on dangerous soil as it shows the riots with no remorse or sugar coating. The lead actor delivers a compelling performance and in the end delivers an incredible speech in the middle of the riots, putting himself between the warring factions screaming 'I am neither Hindu or Muslim; I am Indian, we are all Indians!' A must watch for someone interested in good Indian cinema.

bschandramohan A typical Mani ratnam movie with a warm beginning and after the interval has some good interesting storyline developing. The initial romance between Arvind and Manisha is sweet and the second half where they get embroiled in the dirty politics leading to bomb blasts leads to interesting things. Though there seems to be some bloodspill shown, its not very harsh tone. Hospital scenes where people are searching for their missing ones is heart warming. Its a good communal movie which showcases that violence does not give any win and that if people unite, its stronger than what anti-socials can do.Nazar gives a good performance, so do all the other people in the cast. A.R.Rahman's music is excellent and make a good collection.

srininet1 Wallah! What a movie. Shakes and stirs u till the final moment. I saw it and was amazed at how naturally ManiRathnam captures emotions and brings the whole theatre alive with Superlative Direction, Excellent Music, Super dialogues,etc.....!! Truly worth watching!!