Aamir - remake/inspire of Filipino low budget film Cavite

Aamir synopsis taken from Yahoo

Aamir (noun): A leader (meaning)

Aamir is a man-on-the-run thriller revolving around the eponymous London-based doctor's visit to his family in India.

Geographically, Aamir's maze is set in the Muslim dominated streets and residential pockets of Old Bombay. In its lanes and crowded alleys, cheap restaurants and lodges, amongst nameless pimps and whores, run-down buildings and packed markets, Aamir is made to confront the life he has lived, the 'choices' he has made, his dreams, his loves and his immediate fears.

Through the course of a day, lost in the streets of Mumbai, the question remains - do you choose your destiny, or does destiny choose you?

Does Aamir choose to be a follower or does he rise to become a leader?

Rajeev Khandelwal is amazing!! He sorta reminds me of a clean-cut Emraan Hashmi (I'm in the minority who likes Hashmi). I can definitely see Rajeev taking the debut award.

"Paas Gaya" is a beautiful song. This is just the music video. Music in the movie is played in the background.

Since I've heard nothing but great things about Aamir, I've been excited to watch it. It is not disappointing at all. However, I later learn that it was "inspired" by the Filipino film, Cavite, that released in 2005. Like most "remakes," I like to judge for myself if it is a "remake" or was it "inspired" or an "adaptation."

Therefore, I watched Cavite. You be the judge but I definitely think Aamir definitely "borrows" from Cavite. The title Aamir is powerful because of the name and meaning. Cavite is significant because of the city, Cavite, the most populated state in the Philippines. From this article the Vikas Bahl, Head of UTV Spotboy, have bought the adaptation rights from the makers of Cavite. Director Raj Kumar Gupta and Producer Anuraj Kashyap claim that the script of Aamir is original. However, there are just too many similarities. From the story (guy gets phone call and finds out family will be in danger if he doesn't listen to the villian on the phone) to the locations (populated city with narrow alleys in slums and squatter camps) to the political background (Muslim influences, terrorism, minority oppression). I don't mind Bollywood remakes at all but lately I've seen too many remakes/inspiration/adaptations, not only from Hollywood but Korean films too. Just admit that the movie is taken from another source!

Cavite synopsis taken from MSN Movies

A young man unwillingly becomes embroiled in a terrorist plot in Cavite, a low-budget digital video project from Filipino-American co-writers/co-directors Ian Gamazon and Neill Dela Llana.

The film, shot with a jittery hand-held camera that is almost constantly in motion, opens with a panic-stricken man bringing a bomb onto a Manila bus, then cuts to San Diego, where Adam (Gamazon) is working nights as a security guard and seems to be wasting his life away before he gets a call from his mother in the Philippines, telling him he needs to come home. He's sent off by a protracted transcontinental telephone argument with his American girlfriend, but things get much worse for Adam when he lands in Manila. His mother doesn't arrive to pick him up, and he soon discovers that someone has slipped a package containing a cell phone into his backpack.

The phone rings, he picks it up, and his life is changed forever. On the other end of the line, a sinister voice tells Adam that his mother and sister are being held hostage, that his every move is being watched, and that if he doesn't do exactly as the voice tells him, his family will be killed. As he's led on a grisly tour of the impoverished Cavite region, Adam, a lapsed Muslim, soon realizes that his tormentor is a member of the notorious Abu Sayyaf terrorist group, which is fighting the Philippine government to get Muslim control of the southern section of the country. While sending him through his mysterious "assignment," the caller mocks Adam for his American ways, and his lack of awareness of his own culture.

Cavite was selected by the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the Museum of Modern Art for inclusion in New Directors/New Films in 2006. ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide

So this the rights to Cavite show in the beginning credits? Giving thanks to the Ian Gamazon, the actor/writer/director in Cavite, and Neill Del Llana, the writer/director? I like both for different reasons. I like the slickness of how Aamir was filmed. But I prefer the ending of Cavite, it was more realistic and less heroic than Aamir. Don't get me wrong. I still like Aamir. I think it was told beautifully. What I did prefer Cavite over Aamir - in Cavite, you never saw the villian, you only heard his voice. In Aamir, you were able to see how the villian looked liked. Cavite looked like another Blair Witch Project where it was taken by an amateur, there were too many shaking moments. While Aamir was more professional in that sense.

Look below, I made caps from Aamir and Cavite, which I found similar. No spoilers.



Cell phone call in cab





Frustrated following orders








Populated city with narrow alleys in slums and squatter camps





Vomit scene









Going to next desination





Trying to get to the desination