We all know what a 9/11, 7/26, 12/26 or 11/7 means. These are dates of disaster. Man engineered or Natural. Now it’s the turn of A Wednesday to instill the frustration of a common man agitated with an extremely complacent system. Writer-director Neeraj Pandey makes a stunning statement with a film that boasts of some brilliant performances. And yes at around 90 minutes of edge-of-the-seat excitement, the duration is a big hero of the film.

A faceless, nameless man (Naseeruddin Shah) grips the city with his super sleuth mobile networked bombs. He wants four dreaded terrorists for the city to be saved from a Big Blast. Mumbai police commisioner Rathod (Anupam Kher) and his team of agile cops like Arif Khan (Jimmy Sheirgill) and Jai Pratap (Aamir Bashir) try to crack the case while the unknown face of terror feeds the media with juicy vignettes of information. 

Naseeruddin Shah once again proves why he is such a unbelievable actor. Be it his changeable (between fear and strength of conviction) body language, crisp matter-of-fact dialogue delivery or wry sense of humour, Naseer is a delight to watch.

Anupam Kher should stop doing the C Kompany type silly roles for he is meant only to do A Wednesday. He doesn’t act but rather becomes the character. He is hard yet sensitive, ruthless yet sensible, sharp yet desists from herogiri.

Jimmy Sheirgill as the persecution-free Muslim cop who’s known to be trigger happy and fearless, surprises with his hard-nosed cop act. Fuwad Khan’s spiffy camera work and Neeraj Pandey’s cutting edge dialogues lend a lot of character to this film that is bound to be talked about. 

Now Neeraj Pandey joins the ranks of directors who, one is confident, will be one of those calling the shots in the future.

In short, A Wednesday is amongst the best -- and bravest -- films to come out in 2008. Just one word to describe it: Outstanding!

A Wednesday tells the story of certain events that unfold between 2 and 6 p.m. on A Wednesday in Mumbai. Events that do not exist in any record.