Raj Rachakonda's 8 A.M. Metro is a homage to Gulzar’s poetry. It’s seeped in metaphors and symbolism and revolves around a platonic companionship between two strangers. It’s something Gulzar himself could have made. Indeed, the cherry on the cake is Gulzar’s poetry which acts as the moodboard of sorts for different situations in the film.Iravati (Saiyami Kher), a homemaker living in Nanded, is afraid of travelling by train because of a traumatic situation in the past. Her sister Riya (Nimisha Nair), who stays in Hyderabad, is nearing her term and wants her to be there to support her because of some complications. She somehow musters courage to make the journey and almost faints on the way. Upon reaching the hospital via a rickshaw from Hyderabad, her sister informs her she should have taken the metro as it’s both convenient and affordable. She takes the plunge but has a fainting spell again when the train arrives and is saved by a stranger, Pritam (Gulshan Devaiah). They start meeting during both mornings and evenings and become friends. They share their insecurities and dreams and have conversations about everything under the sun. The relationship is devoid of sexual frisson. It’s a melding of minds who find answers to each others’ trouble through conversations.
As said earlier, Gulzar’s poetry elevates the film. Iravati is a poet and has a habit of distilling her experiences into poetry. Everytime she writes something new, it correlates to the things that she has experienced. Gulzar had been especially commissioned to write on each situation and has done a wonderful job as usual. Saiyami Kher takes her time to bring gravitas to her reading. At first, she’s somewhat off the mark but latches on to the emotions contained in the word as the film progresses. It’s seldom that we see poetry becoming a character of sorts in a film and it’s good to see it being done in a current film.
The film examines man-woman relationships. Both the protagonists are married and seen to be as happy as can be in their respective marriages. They open up, as we often do, to strangers and slowly find themselves drawn to each other. The film is trying to say that men and women, given the ideal set of circumstances, can be friends as well if they learn to give friendship a chance. A balance is needed in such a scenario and the two protagonists never lose their footing, keeping true to the invisible boundaries of their respective relationships.
It’s basically a two character film held together by the performances of Saiyami Kher and Gulshan Devaiah. Saiyami has grown as a performer with every outing and is at her finest here. The frailty, the insecurities of her character come alive in the expressions and body language. The actor makes us privy to the small joys and victories of Iravati’s life and makes us root for her. Gulshan is a fine actor and while he does go a tad over-the-top near the end, he makes the role his own in the rest of the film. There’s a quiet dignity to his character. We see glimpses of the grief lurking within, even as he goes about silently suffering. The two actors are well-matched and lend able support to each other. Mention must also be made of Nimisha Nair, who plays Iravati’s younger sister and of Kalpika Ganesh, who plays Gulshan’s wife in the film. Both are competent in their respective roles.
It’s not as if the film isn’t without faults. The director should have kept a faster pace and trimmed it to two hours or so. At 162 minutes, it feels a bit long. It’s buoyed by sterling performances by both Saiyami Kher and Gulshan Devaiah and the lyrical appeal of the narrative.
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