Writer-director Amole Gupte looks at the life of the fringe people in the city with a huge amount of compassion. Here is an artiste who happens to be a filmmaker. He is not the least fearful of stepping into the streets of the uncaring city looking for empathy and compassion in the unlikeliest of places.
And finding it!
You may feel that little Arjun encounters too many thoughtful people in a city notorious for its brutal insensitivity. But that's Amole Gupte for you. Whether it was the hunger for food in "Stanley Ka Dabba" or the yearning to achieve one's dreams in this film, the child at the centre of the plot is constantly being given a chance to find his identity amidst the turmoil, chaos and bustle of Mumbai.
Arjun's dreams are visualised not as a fairty-tale, but an obtainable reality.
The narration glides forward in the same streamlined movements as little Arjun's big dreams on the roller skates. The director allows the dream to grow on its own volition until Partho's yearnings acquire wings and soar to a splendid culmination where the director intercuts scenes from the boy's past with the present race on roller skates.
