ta ra rum pum

Rajveer (known as R.V.) is your typical Indian New York cabbie in a largely Indian populated Hindi speaking New York. He is mad about driving fast cars and dreams of being a famous Nascar driver. With the help of his friend Harry he gets a shot at the New York Speedway. He wins his race and is hired as a race driver. This marks the beginning of his career in Nascar and he is soon the best racing driver in the field. Simultaneously he meets Shona, they fall in love, marry, and have two children, a son and a daughter, to whom they allot typically Indian names: Princess and Champ.

After eight successful years at the top of the Nascar leagues R.V. is faced with a rival. A new driver called Rusty hits the scene. Rusty is evil because his car is black and he smiles whenever someone gets knocked off the track (usually they get knocked off by him). In their first race together Rusty knocks R.V. (spectacularly) off the road and R.V. is hospitalised. He recovers but loses his confidence as regards future racing. After a string of failures, and not having saved for a rainy day, R.V is sacked from the team. The family house in the suburbs is repossessed, the family are forced to move to the Bronx in reduced circumstances, and R.V has to resume his old job as a lowly cabbie. Rather than admit reduced circumstances to their children R.V. and Shona tell them they are moving to the Bronx to take part in a reality show and that they must be brave if it seems a little tough at first. Initially the children are stupid enough to buy this utter bollocks. But later they realise what's going on and rather than discuss it with their parents they elect to stop eating lunch at school in order to save their lunch money to help their Mum and Dad out.

Champ eventually collapses and is hospitalised. He needs an operation (for what?) if he is going to survive and it is going to cost 65 000 US dollars. R.V. has no medical insurance so there is only one thing for it - he must go back to Nascar and race again to save his son. His old team, Speeding Saddles, won't take him back but his taxi driver friends and Harry club together enough money to get hold of a race car and become his team instead. A comeback race follows and at the beginning Rusty (remember he is evil) says 'this time I'll take R.V. off the road for good' and then laughs (an evil laugh). The race begins and things go back and forward. Rusty tries some underhand tactics but they fail because R.V. is too sharp. He has to be. His son's life is on the line. Just before the finish line R.V. rams Rusty. Rusty's car flips into the air and he is killed in an ensuing inferno. R.V. crosses the finish line and victory is finally his again. Everyone cheers, Champ simultaneously comes out of his coma, nobody cares that Rusty is dead (because he was evil), and everything goes swiftly back to normal. R.V. regains his dignity and the life that once was his.

This is a brief summary of 'Ta Ra Rum Pum,' the film I went to see last night at the Ritz Cineplex in Shimla. There were only about three of us in the large cinema but I think we all enjoyed it. I certainly did. The film was in Hindi without subtitles although occasionally sentences like, 'hey chill out ok,' would pop out in English. This helped me understand what was going on better. For example, there was one scene between Shona and her wealthy disapproving father in which she was telling him that she planned to marry R.V. and he was saying he didn't approve. I was struggling to get the jist of this but then he blurted out, 'but no college education,' I knew then what was going on. R.V. was played by a slightly too 'buff' for my liking Saif Ali Khan, and Shona was played by the extremely attractive actress Rani Mukerji. Harry, the mate, was played by the Indian comedian Jaaved Jaffrey. I enjoyed watching Jaaved Jaffrey the most although he is not in a lot of the film.

On an uncharitable day I might discuss various holes I noticed in the plot, and the unclear morality of the some the characters, but this is not such a day so I'll point out instead that the interspersed music and dance routines were terrific, and the high gloss filming of New York was terrific.

My favourite bit of the film came towards the beginning when R.V. is given his big shot. Shona (who at this point is playing hard to get) reluctantly goes to watch him and takes a seat in the middle of the 100 000 plus Nascar stadium crowd. R.V. shouts across from the pit: 'you came' and with seemingly superhuman powers of hearing she distinguishes his voice and hears his two word comment. Coyly, she says back: 'good luck cabbie,' and he, also endowed with superhuman hearing gives her a thumbs up and then tears off in his car to the start line and to victory.