Matialth Good concept, poorly executed.

FuzzyTagz If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

TrueHello Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

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

SnoopyStyle Various passengers from various backgrounds are on a bus to Calcutta. Raja Chowdhury is asked to look after Meenakshi Iyer and her baby son. Other passengers include a bunch of loud young people, two Sikh men, an elderly Muslim couple, a couple making out, a woman and her mentally-handicap son, and some men playing cards. There is religious strife in the country. The bus encounters a closed road. The driver takes a detour and ends up at a roadblock with other vehicles. There has been attacks and a Hindu mob descends on the religiously mix group.It's a post-9/11 melodrama about race relations in India. It's a little heavy-handed and a bit too long. That does subtract from the intensity. The group on the bus is deliberately random and carefully selected. I do give everyone involved full marks for the sincere effort. The newly formed couple is pretty effective.

Curried Belle I am amazed by one detail in this movie, and thats the sensuality with which Aparna Sen has picturized her daughter in Mr and Mrs Iyer. Its not new in Indian cinema what with Raj and Rishi Kapoor, Mahesh and Pooja Bhatt, the relentless Amitabh and Jaya and Abhishek Bachchan and many more.I was going to say outright that the acting sucked. But it works only where affection is meant to ignite between Meenakshi Iyer (Konkona Sen) and Raja/Jehangir Chaudhary (Rahul Bose), which is forced upon us. The music kills you, especially what is supposed to be Hindustani music has a vocalist (Ustad Zakhir Hussain ? ) singing in English ! The body language cannot be translated to English vocabulary. When there are scenes of fanatic mob attacks or a young woman cajoling her husband, as an Indian I understand the stiffness as a result of excessive hand movement for example where language is not expressing enough.The only Indian-English movie I've seen which works is Monsoon Wedding, but of course the difference being that movie deals with characters whose first language is English. Pretty Rahul Bose has a scene where he is roped into pretend as the conductor of a broken down bus and lie about 5 star accommodation in the middle of a war-ravaged area (seems like it could be near the border of West Bengal-Bangladesh). And he speaks in his native public-school accent.Unless you're an Indian, there is little to relate to in this movie. Thumbs down anyway.

mayankbakshi-1 This is one of those movies, which one wished that never ended. And yet, the end gives the movie a perfect closure. The movie starts in a fairy tale narrative. The end justifies it in some sense when Raja hands over the roll of film to Meenakshi, thereby eliminating the possibility for him to be able to justify the story as a real one.Between these two points the movie is a touching, gripping and to some extent, even incredible story of two strangers that help out each other in demanding times. In one of the most beautiful depictions in Indian cinema, Aparna Sen manages to subtly portray a variety of human emotions such as love, anger, hate, happiness, disgust and fear.To top it all are brilliant acting performances by the lead actors.All in all, a must watch for any parallel cinema enthusiast.

manjits An exceptional movie. Aparna Sen's choice of majority Hindu population as perpetrators of communal violence was daring, and probably killed the film's prospects at the box office,but significant. There have been innumerable instances of communal violence in India against Muslims, lower class Hindus and Sikhs, for which not a single person has spent a day behind bars. True to life, Aparna Sen's film isn't focused on the violence or the people behind those crimes. That happens. The terror is in the background, only it's effect on the protagonists is visible on screen. The main story is about the change of heart of an orthodox, highly educated, prejudiced and ignorant woman. Some of the subtle nuances would probably escape non-Indian viewers, but there are plenty of things to appreciate for all. The ending ("Goodbye Mr Iyer") would easily be among the best 10 endings I have ever seen in any movies among them Mouchette and Dead Poet's Society. In the acting department,all the cast have acted well, but special mention must be made of Konkana Sensharma for her outstanding performance. Aparna Sen's direction is outstanding, and outclasses any of Mani Ratnam's films who makes similar kind of political-personal dramas. A must see movie for all.