Aamir (Meaning: The Leader in Arabic)

Tight situation, taut nerves, tense minds.

While the plot may seem similar to the Johnny Depp-starrer “Nick of Time”, “Aamir”, newcomer Rajkumar Gupta's attempt at portraying the moderate Indian Muslim's mind through small screen heartthrob Rajeev Khandelwal’s histrionics, is a short yet gripping story of a young UK-returned (just about) Muslim doctor's entanglement with the dark, unsavory world of Islamic terror.

The boy-next-door Aamir finds himself completely helpless and bewildered when -- just he steps out of the Mumbai airport -- he is informed that his family is held hostage by a terror master, who wants a certain "task" to be performed by Aamir.

Before he is even able to give it a thought, Amir finds himself strolling through some of the Muslim-dominated localities of Maximum city. The camera excruciatingly pans seedy bylanes, a revolting visit to a stinking local latrine, a chase by a suspicious policeman and other such "experiences" comprises the package tour planned for the well-to-do doctor, living a life sanitised of the supposed daily tribulations of Muslims in India.

Of course, as one would have obviously guessed, the whole idea of the excursion was to brainwash Aamir into doing "something" worthwhile for the Qaum! And that "something", as Aamir discovers by the end of the movie, is to plant a bomb in a packed Mumbai bus.

Torn between the options of saving his dear ones and blowing up scores of innocent people, Aamir does the unthinkable (Oh! not the usual Bollywood brand of "unthinkable". Something more poignant, simple and obvious). Find out what for yourself.

Till then following orders out of fear and desperation -- uncharacteristic of the meaning of his name -- the youth proves to be the real attitudinal leader for his community in the climax.

The slick cinematography, with the camera zipping in and out of Mumbai's dark underbelly, keeps you glued.

For a big-screen fresher Rajeev Khandelwal comes across as a real find. His shades of expression, with sprinklings of agony, fear, frustration, desperation, anger and moral rectitude in a way brings out the dilemma of many a Muslim youth of the day.

However, just one scene exposes the director's bias against the Muslim community, thereby making me biased against the otherwise splendid movie.

As Aamir takes away the deadly explosives in a suitcases from another Muslim dominated locality (I suspect south Mumbai’s Nagpada), every Tom, Dick and Harry -- right from the stereotyped Muslim butcher, to the paanwallah, to the shopkeeper, to the bystander to the customer in the shop -- is portrayed as silently colluding in the conspiracy by virtue of the pregnant stares they give Aamir and the suitcase.

My view: Go for it.