The only thing cooler than a title like Bombay 405 Miles is the film itself. Remembering Brij’s befitting tribute to the sub-genre he was best known for.
In the 1970s Hindi cinema enjoyed a series of films that were a hybrid of many genres. These films found their genesis in the caper or the thrillers of the mid 1960s such as Teesri Manzil (1966), An Evening in Paris (1967), A Night in London (1967), Kismat (1968) and featured a little bit of comedy, thriller, mystery, romance and high drama along with some lilting tunes. The 1970s also saw a steady flow of such films – Victoria 203 (1970), Hera Pheri (1976), Chacha Bhatija (1977), Dhongee (1979) – and the only discerning difference was a dip in the quality of the music. By the early 1980s, this genre was dead but not before a befitting tribute paid by the very filmmaker who practically invented this sub-genre. The two directors who popularized such films were Manmohan Desai and Brij Sadanah but while the former is an acknowledged genius, the latter remains forgotten. Although Manmohan Desai’s Kismat is credited as the trailblazer thanks to its enduring popularity, it was Brij who perhaps defined the genre best with A Night in London, gave it it’s high-point in the breezy Victoria 203 and, interestingly enough, helmed the last of the good ones in this unique genre - Bombay 405 Miles (1980).
Some films have you at the title and Bombay 405 Miles is one such film. With multiple story tracks tightly running parallel only to converge in the end, Bombay 405 Miles is vintage Brij. Written by K.A. Narayan, a regular with both Brij and Vijay Anand, and dialogues by Kader Khan, the frenetic screenplay rarely slacks. Bombay 405 Miles also has interesting set pieces, a good cast (Vinod Khanna, Shatrughan Sinha, Zeenat Aman, Pran, Iftekhar, Deven Verma and Amjad Khan) and last but not the least a funky background score by Kalyanji-Anandji.
The film has three concurrent story tracks starting with Ranvir Singh (Ifthekhar) along with his wife and children being killed by his adopted evil brother Veer Singh (Amjad Khan) for money. Veer accidental kills the servant’s daughter instead of his niece and to makes matters worse Ranvir survives but loses his mental semblance. Veer’s goons find the niece but two good for nothing criminals Kishan (Shatrughan Sinha) and Kanhaiya (Vinod Khanna) save her. The two have been ordered out of their cities limits by the court and they bump into each other at a bus stop that is 405 miles from Bombay. They become friends and also end up falling for the same woman, Radha (Zeenat Aman), a petty schemer herself. When Kishan and Kanhaiya are handed over the little girl by Ranvir’s dying man Friday, they are told ‘she’ is worth millions and will speak one day. What they don’t know is that it’s the little girl’s doll who will ‘speak’ thanks to a hidden CD recorder that Ranvir switched on to record Veer’s confession. Initially, Kishan and Kanhaiya try to extort money from Veer in exchange for the little girl but have a change of heart. The third track features Masterji (Pran), a wheeler-dealer, who along with Radha tries to outsmart Kishan and Kanhaiya but joins hands when he learns that Veer Singh killed his, Masterji’s, daughter in place of his niece. In the end, the most unexpected adversary outplays the evil-meister Veer…
It’s fascinating how even after 35-years Bombay 405 Miles manages to remain immensely entertaining. Of course, things such as Vinod Khanna silting his wrists to offer blood to save the little girl or jumping off a train to get some water from a hut along the tracks and then simply hopping back on appear asinine and at two hours forty-two minutes the film is slightly long but on the whole Bombay 405 Miles is far from jaded. Many elements in Bombay 405 Miles are reminiscent of Victoria No 203, Brij’s best-remembered film, especially the camaraderie between Vinod Khanna and Shatrughan Sinha, which is an ode to Ashok Kumar and Pran. Both Khanna and Sinha rarely got all out comic roles but the two are a hoot here and what’s more, at places Khanna even does an Amitabh Bachchan from Amar Akbar Anthony and Sinha mimics Raj Kapoor and for a better part copies Johnny Walker, who incidentally was the sidekick in Brij’s A Night in London.
Along with the film itself things such as Amjad Khan evoking the spirit of Gabbar Singh with the same evil laugh or chastising his gang for bowing down to ‘do admi’ and the Hera Pheri esque cons that Khanna and Sinha’s characters pull form a perfect tribute to the brisk-paced ‘70s entertainers. Befittingly certain things from Bombay 405 Miles ended up inspiring instances in Welcome where a stressed out Akshay Kumar hands over the car’s steering wheel to Paresh Rawal or Kya Kool Hai Hum (2005) where Anupam Kher plays with the Baoding or Chinese meditation balls that Amjad Khan keeps rotating in his hands. Brij’s tragic end where in an inebriated state he shot himself dead after killing his wife and daughter and firing at his son, Kamal Sadanah, who survived the attack, is far from the films he made but like they say, sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction.
- Gautam Chintamani is the author of the best-selling Dark Star: The Loneliness of Being Rajesh Khanna (2014) and Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak – The Film That Revived Hindi Cinema (2016) | Tweet him – http://www.twitter.com/gchintamani
Images – Osiannama
http://osianama.com/film-titles/bombay-405-miles-1980?search=Bombay%20405%20Miles%201980
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