New York (2009 film)

In the United States in 2008, the FBI arrest Omar Aijaz, a young Muslim man originally from Delhi, after finding guns in the trunk of a taxi cab he owned. Omar is then taken into custody and interrogated by FBI Agent Roshan, also a Muslim man originally from South Asia who has been living in the United States for twenty years. Omar then discovers that he was set up by the FBI to force him to spy on a former college friend, Sameer "Sam" Sheikh, whom he has not seen in seven years and who the FBI believes is a terrorist. In the process, Omar discovers that Sam has married Maya, a mutual friend whom Omar had a crush on in university and finds out that Sam and Maya have a young son, Danyal.

Roshan orders Omar to tell him everything he knows about Sam. The film then flashes back to September 1999, when Omar begins his studies at the New York State University. He is befriended by his international student counselor Maya and learns that though she was born and raised in New York, she is fluent in Hindi because of her mother's interest in Bollywood films. Omar also meets Sam, an American Muslim who is also fluent in Hindi due to the fact that his father is a professor of Indian studies. Over the next two years, all three become inseparable friends and gradually Omar falls in love with Maya. When Omar realises that she loves Sam, however, he distances himself from them both. Their carefree days end with the onset of the September 11 attacks, or 9/11.

After finishing his story, Omar agrees to help Roshan (rather reluctantly), if only to prove that both he and Sam are innocent. He reunites with Maya and Sam and stays in their house, all the while spying for the FBI. Omar learns that Maya is a civil rights activist who is helping one of Sam's employees, Zilgai overcome his experience as a former 9/11 detainee. Zilgai was eventually released due to lack of evidence and has been having difficulty adjusting back to normal life.

As time progresses, Omar feels satisfied that he can find nothing to warrant the FBI's suspicions and is ready to leave when a series of events forces him to reconsider. In the process, Omar learns from Sam that ten days after 9/11, Sam was arrested and detained for a period of nine months as a suspected terrorist, a charge which everyone, including the FBI and Roshan, now agree was incorrect. Though he was eventually released due to lack of evidence, the impact of being detained and tortured permanently changed Sam in ways which are difficult for those surrounding him to understand, leaving him with feelings of deep resentment towards the FBI. Omar thus finds that Sam ultimately resorted to plans for terrorism as a means of revenge.

In addition, Maya is unable to help Zilgai resolve the trauma of being a detainee. After a routine traffic stop escalates and an NYPD police officer gives Maya a very rough full-body search, Zilgai becomes agitated. He drops Maya at her home and eventually kills the police officer the same night. After being declared a fugitive, Zilgai leads the police on a long chase ultimately ending in his suicide.

The climax of the film rests upon the attempts of Maya, Omar, and Roshan to prevent Sam from committing an act of terrorism by telling him that if he perpetuates towards terrorism, others will suffer as he has. Finally convinced, Sam surrenders and aborts his attempt to bomb the FBI building. However, the moment he drops his cell-phone (which was originally intended as a detonator for the bomb) he is shot and killed by FBI snipers. The cell phone falls benign to the ground without activating anything. Maya, who was running toward Sam, is also killed by stray gunfire and Omar, bereft of speech, breaks down.

Six months later, Omar has adopted Danyal, and Roshan has received commendation for aiding in the anti-terrorism cause. Omar is comforted by Roshan who explains to him that; everybody was right in their place, but the timing was wrong. As for Sam, the path he chose killed him. Everybody has moved on after 9/11, as its high time. They reconcile each other. The film ends with all three of them going out for pasta and a side note describing the after-effects of 9/11.

• John Abraham as Sameer "Sam" Sheikh
• Neil Nitin Mukesh as Omar Aijaz
• Katrina Kaif as Maya Sheikh
• Irrfan Khan as Agent Roshan
• Nawazuddin Siddiqui as Zilgai
• Aidan Wagner as Danyal Sheikh-Sameer
• Samrat Chakrabarti as Yakub
• Jakir Ajmeri
• Ali Quli Mirza

New York explores the aftermath of 9/11. In a June 2009 interview with the Indo-Asian News Service (IANS), director Kabir Khan argued that the film "is based on part of the political canvas of 9/11, but it speaks of prejudices after the great human tragedy. It is a definite and very relevant subject about post-9/11 prejudices that have increased after the attacks [...] We have in fact divided time in a pre- and post-9/11 world in the film to highlight its obvious repercussions in times to come. The repercussions of the attacks are still very strongly felt globally and will continue to do so."[2] Khan continued to state that the film had the full support of the New York Film Commission, " as it is not an anti-something film. It is a very balanced story and not a jingoistic film."[2] In a separate interview with IANS, actor John Abraham argued that, "in its own strange way, New York begins where Pakistani film Khuda Ke Liye ended. That's the interesting part of the film [...] Each director has his own way of interpreting and researching the plight of legal detainees." Abraham continued by suggesting that this is why Khan and Shoaib Mansoor offer different interpretations of these events in their respective films. The plot of New York is similar to ''The Greater Good'', the twenty-first episode of the first season of ABC TV series Lost.[3] New York was the first Indian film which focused on this theme, later followed by Karan Johar's My Name Is Khan (2010), Kurbaan (2009), and Vishwaroopam (2013).

Production began in September 2008 and filming lasted over a period of 100 days. Most of the shoot took place in New York although some of the scenes which took place in New York were actually shot in Philadelphia. New York is the first Hindi film to have a production schedule there.[4][5] In preparation for his role as an American Muslim of Indian origin, Abraham studied the Quran.[6] Khan had to submit his script for approval from U.S. authorities before making the film. He stated: "We had to submit the script to seek permission to shoot in Guantanamo as well as in the States and we got their green signal to go ahead very easily. The film may be about 9/11 and what happens post it, but they did not object to our theme and did not even raise any questions. The US officials were very cooperative and we shot for around 3 days at this high-profile prison."[7]

The soundtrack of New York was released on 10 June 2009. The songs and the theme featured in the soundtrack are composed by Pritam, Julius Packiam and Pankaj Awasthi and the lyrics are penned by Sandeep Shrivastava and Junaid Wasi. Julius Packiam composed the film score. The remix version of "Hai Junoon" used in the end credits of the film is sung by K.K. & Monali Thakur and not available in the original soundtrack. All the songs proved to be major hits post release with the songs "Hai Junoon" and "Tune Jo Na Kaha" declared as chartbusters.

The DVD for New York was released on 8 August 2009.[32] Joginder Tuteja of Bollywood Hungama gave the DVD four out of five stars. The DVD includes (but is not limited to) 2.5 hours of special features such as: "Making of the Film," "Deleted Scenes," "New York Special – Zoom TV," "The New Yorkers – CNN-IBN," and a number of music videos.[33]

• List of cultural references to the September 11 attacks
• The Reluctant Fundamentalist
• Khuda Kay Liye (2007) a Pakistani film related to the same.

• Official website
• New York at Yash Raj Films
• New York at IMDb