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The camera drifts, the focus slips, the figures shift; everything onscreen feels fragile and impermanent.
Rather, the sound is so sparse and quiet its as if were watching a ghost world.
Occasionally, voices do waft in, unseen and unnamed, each speaking in a different language about Mumbai.
Another tells us he came here after fighting with his father.
There have been city symphonies in cinema before, but Kapadias film is altogether more pensive and intimate.
Call it a city nocturne or a city whisper.
Without contrivance or overdramatization, Kapadia allows these characters stories to trickle into our consciousness.
Anu is in love with a young Muslim man, and the two must meet surreptitiously.
Parvaty, meanwhile, has no documented proof of her residence.
Its all part of the troubling essence of this place.
Some people call this the city of dreams, but I dont.
I think its the city of illusions, intones one of the many unidentified voices on the soundtrack.
The Mumbai here is a place where everyone comes and nobody feels at home.
Which in turn means nobody has the room to claim a better life.
Now, a reality that seemed forever on the verge of dissolving tips into something resembling magical realism.
The film may end on notes of joy, but what lingers is more sadness.
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