Dum Maro Dum

Rating : 5/10
Release Date : 22nd April, 2011
Time : 130 minutes
Director : Rohan Sippy ; Writer : Shridhar Raghavan, Charudutt Acharya ; Music : Pritam
Starring : Abhishek Bachchan, Rana Duggabati, Bipasha Basu, Prateik Babbar, Aditya Pancholi, Govind Namdeo, Gantois Gomes

Another slickly shot film that lacks soul. Interesting camera work, editing techniques, lighting and post production are unable to compensate for ordinary acting, uni-dimensional characters and a drugs drama that lacks high points or lethal twists.




Abhishek is a corrupt cop gone straight after his family is killed in a car accident with a drug-high driver. He now is given a licence to clean up Goa, which seems more like a United Nations convention given the various nationalities in the state with their fingers in the lucrative drugs trade. Along the way he meets the good guys, Rana (a singer who wants to help clean up the state for reason or reasons unknown), Prateik (a bright student who agrees to be a carrier only to make enough to be able to pay his US college tuition fee) and Bipasha (Rana’s girlfriend who agreed to be a carrier so that she could get a job as a flight attendant).



The baddies include Aditya Pancholi (with a ridiculous screen name), who is the guy controlling most of the drugs trade and Michael Barbosa, who seemingly controls Aditya. Abhishek’s squad includes a junior cop (not 100% sure but I think its Gantois Gomes, bringing in the Goan flavour and some of the funniest lines (‘it’s a shit job’) and Govind Namdeo, a veteran, who brings sarcastic one liners and an intricate knowledge of the drugs trade to the posse.


The storyline doesn’t hang together coherently enough but cant get into more details for fear of giving the story away. There is a pall of darkness over the film, a sense of tragedy that the sporadic attempts at humour are not strong enough to lift. You sense a little bit of ‘Usual Suspects’ in here but it didn’t manage to build characters as intricate or relatable as in that film. The soundtrack is average, the main love track sung by Papon being the one which will get replayed very often. The title track didn’t work for me but then I’m fully aware that I’m not the target audience for this version.



I liked Rana. He seems to have something about him that promises better in the future, carries himself well. Abhishek is good without ever seeming to be able to bring the intensity or angst to his role, that, for example, his father was able to bring almost effortlessly in several films (Zanjeer, Trishul or even the same production house's Shakti). Bipasha, Prateik, Aditya have roles that don’t demand too much. What really drives the film is its styling – innovative angles, clothing, some very good post production / colouring techniques, locations.


You can sense what was being attempted here and that thought needs to be supported in an era where a lot of films are being made for ‘timepass’. However, unfortunately the thought didn’t really set the screen on fire, flickering more like a candle than a roaring flame. It’s a rocket ship that takes off but then doesn’t really manage to get past the Earth’s atmosphere.