As the romantic-sociopolitical drama turns 25, we take you through the journey of the film's making, with several interesting trivia. Read...

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25 Years of Bombay: A nostalgic look-back at the Mani Ratnam film, whose politics is still relevant today; 50+ lesser-known facts

Team CE

Published:10th Mar, 2020 at 3:26 PM

During the recording of the background score of Mani Ratnam's Thiruda Thiruda (1993), the Bombay riots broke out.

Mani Ratnam planned on making a film in Malayalam about a boy who gets lost in the riots, and requested M. T. Vasudevan Nair to write the script.

This was supposed to be Mani Ratnam's second Malayalam film after Unaru (1985).

But since the idea did not materialise, he decided to make it in Tamil as the film that would later be titled Bombay.

Mani Ratnam held a photo shoot for the film with Vikram and Manisha Koirala, but eventually did not choose Vikram as he was unwilling to remove his beard that he had then grown for Pudhiya Mannargal.

According to Mani Ratnam, Bombay was not originally planned as a political film: 'It was a phase India was going through and these things affected me and found their way into my work.'

Manisha Koirala's voice was dubbed by Rohini.

Nassar, a Muslim in real life, was cast as the father of Arvind Swamy's character (a Hindu) while Kitty, a Hindu in real life, was cast as the father of Koirala's character (a Muslim).

Ratnam deliberately did this reverse casting in those roles as a statement.

Cameraman Rajiv Menon was offered the lead role by Mani Ratnam, but he turned it down.

When Mani approached cinematographer Rajiv Menon to shoot Bombay, he described it as a film about the riots and said that he needed to '(make what came before) the riots as beautiful as possible'

So, Rajiv Menon suggested shooting in the rains and in the background of water bodies to achieve the effect.

Rajiv explained in an interview that, 'The camera moves a lot; there would be long takes followed by three-four small cuts. It made lighting continuity easier for me and I was able to move fluidly.'

The interiors of homes were completely shot in Pollachi in Tamil Nadu

The exteriors were shot in Kasaragod, and Kannur village in Kerala.

The song 'Kannalane' was shot at Thirumalai Nayakkar Mahal in Madurai.

The 'Uyire' song was was shot at Bekal Fort in Kerala.

Rajiv said in that interview that Mani and him, both have a fascination for how Guru Dutt shot his song sequences, and it influenced their making. They were also inspired by Satyajit Ray's style.

The demolition of the Babri Masjid was shown onscreen through newspaper headlines and photographs, as the Censor Board did not want the makers to show the actual destruction.

Bombay is the second in Ratnam's trilogy of films that depict human relationships against a background of Indian politics, including Roja (1992) and Dil Se.. (1998).

The film tells the story of an inter-religious family in Bombay during the communal Bombay riots, which took place between Dec 1992 and Jan 1993 after the demolition of the Babri Masjid.

Mani Ratnam described Bombay as 'a positive film about communal harmony'.

Mani also said that said the Bombay riots were not the main focus of the film, but 'a helpless, innocent man caught up in violence not of his own making.'

Several scenes of the city of Mumbai during riots were recreated with the help of photographs.

Prakash Raj, who had debuted with Duet an year earlier, did a cameo in the film.

Bombay was released on 10 March 1995. The Telugu-dubbed version, Bombayi, was released on the same day.

The film was also dubbed in Hindi and Malayalam with the same title.

Eventually becoming one of the highest-grossing films of Tamil cinema, the film was well-received both critically and commercially, upon release.

Bombay was screened at many international film festivals including the Philadelphia Film Festival in 1996 where it was adjudged as an audience favourite.

The film caused considerable controversy upon release in India and abroad for its depiction of inter-religious relations and religious riots

Bombay was banned in Singapore and Malaysia upon release.

The film's soundtrack, consisting of 8 songs, sold 15 million units, becoming one of the best-selling soundtracks of all time, and earning Rahman his 4th consecutive Filmfare Best MusicDirector Award

The soundtrack was released in multiple languages.

The lyrics for the Tamil version were written by Vairamuthu, except for the song 'Halla Gulla', which was written by Vaali.

The lyrics for the Hindi and Telugu versions were written by Mehboob and Veturi Sundararama Murthy, respectively. The Hindi version includes Urdu lyrics.

The soundtrack was included in The Guardian's '1000 Albums to Hear Before You Die' list.

Kehna Hi Kya/Kannalanae, sung by K S Chitra was included in their '1000 Songs Everyone Must Hear' list.

BBC Music listed Bombay among their '20 Greatest Soundtracks' of all time, and selected the instrumental 'Bombay Theme' as its standout track.

The Hamma Hamma song became one of the pop-culture elements of the 90s.

The song 'Hamma' was later reused in Ok Jaanu (2017) as 'The Humma Song'.

'Bombay Theme' has appeared in various international films and music compilations, while 'Kehna Hi Kya' and 'Bombay Theme' have been sampled by various international artists.

'Kannalane', also known as 'Kehna Hi Kya', is based on Qawwali, a form of Islamic Sufi music.

Chithra won the Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Female Playback for 'Kannalane'.

The Hindi version of the song, Kehna Hi Kya, was also sampled by Ciara for her 2009 song 'Turntables', featuring Chris Brown.

Hariharan believes that Uyire is the best one he has ever sung.

After composing the Uyire song, AR Rahman had three choices for the vocalist - S. P. Balasubrahmanyam, K. J. Yesudas and Hariharan.

ARR says: 'I had 3 options for that song. SPB, Yesudas, Hariharan. Then I imagined all of them singing it. Since I had not heard Hari in a non-ghazal kind of song, I decided to take the gamble.'

The Tamil track 'Andha Arabic Kadaloram' had two different versions. The original release contained only A. R. Rahman's version.

The re-released version of Hamma Hamma in Tamil contained the rap portions by Remo Fernandes, which were recorded for the Hindi dubbed version.

'Kuchi Kuchi' song had supporting vocals by GV Prakash.

All the Hindi lyrics were written by Mehboob.

The song 'Humma Humma' has a cover version by Urvah Khan in the album Mujahir (The Immigrant Songs).

The tune in 'Humma Humma' at 0:23, is the same tune in the song 'Koi Jaye To Le Aaye' at 0:34 ,from the film Ghatak.

Sonali Bendre made a special appearance in 'Humma Humma'

The dubbed Hindi version had a theatrical release in Canada.

The Hollywood movie Lord of War used the 'Bombay Theme Music' in the film.

Spanish rapper sampled the song ' Kehna Hai Kya' for his song ' Sueno Despierto'.

The album, Bahwee - Headnodders Volume 2, has a instrumental version of the song 'Kehna Hi Kya'. The song was titled 'Bollywood'. The album was released for an international audience.

Harsha Yallapragada (Sumeet) played Kabir Narayan.

Hriday Yallapragada played his twin, Kamal Basheer.

Bombay was ranked among the top 20 Indian films in the British Film Institute's rankings

Even the Hindi version of the film earned INR14 crore (US$2.1 million), which was phenomenal for a dubbed film.

Actor Rallapalli portrayed a transgender in the film.

In July 2005, a book on the film by Lalitha Gopalan was published by BFI Modern Classics, looking at the film's production, the several issues it covered, and its impact upon release.

The film won two National Film Awards in 1996 - Nargis Dutt Award for Best Feature Film on National Integration and Best Editing – Suresh Urs.

Bombay won the gala award at the 1995 Edinburgh International Film Festival (Scotland).

Bombay also got the special award at the 1996 Political Film Society Awards (United States)

The latter part of the film takes place during 1992, but in a scene set a few years earlier, Shekhar is wearing a Colorado Rockies shirt. The Rockies were established in 1993.

Here are a few memorable snapshots, rare posters, working stills and paper ads of the 1995 film...