Mumbai Mafia: Police vs the Underworld

It's a quick and cerebral look at the rise of D-company, police encounters, and how the city of Bombay (now Mumbai) evolved over the years. There was a time when encounter specialists deemed themselves judge, jury, and executioner - they'd ruthlessly remove gangsters from the dangerous streets of Mumbai by shooting them dead. The media also hailed them as saviours of the city, because it was easy to do so. Encounters would always make for front page news or shocking headlines, so it was natural for the officers to get a high out of it. When the world became more inquisitive about at least some of these questionable encounters, the saviours turned villains. The morality behind this is what the documentary leaves you to think about. At 87 minutes, it's an engaging affair.

Mumbai underworld has always been a fascinating topic in Indian films, novels and discussions. Now with the current trend in web series, the Bombay Mafia as it was known is showing its presence on OTT as well. Along with Hanslal Mehta's Scoop, Netflix has created an international crew documentary titled "Mumbai Mafia: Police vs The Underworld". This well-shot documentary has been made by British film-maker- Morgan Matthews. It covers the journey and important incidents of the underworld from 1991 to 2022! It covers interviews of major police officers, journalists and ex-D-company person and also shows the impact of shootouts, gang wars, and encounters and also opens old wounds of the Mumbai 1993 riots and the blasts. Although Bollywood has covered almost all of these issues in popular films like Shootout at Lokhandwala, Black Friday,Bombay,Ab tak Chappan etc ,still the documentary with a running time of app 1.5 hours is an interesting watch. A slickly made docu for people interested in real-life underworld and encounter specialists!!

Mumbai mafia:police vs the underworld is a crime documentary film directed by raaghav dar and francis longhurst.

This docu does many things right and some things wrong. The police and their functioning is basically the centerstage here. Ravindra angre, pradeep sharma and all the other members of the encounter squad are interviewed and their views are thoroughly shown. They are unapologetic but also remorseful at the same time. 'Nobody likes to kill people' is what one police officer says. AA khan resigns even. This docu does humanize the police officials in a controversial encounter story. The gangsters are hardly focused upon. Dawood's background is touched and not detailed. Minty tejpal and hussain zaidi make appearances here and it was an honour to listen to them.

The screenplay during the bombay blast aftermath becomes slow in the first half. It shifts attention and loses its grip.

I would rate this docu 8.5.

Documentary gives us the brief insight into the world of 90s Mumbai Mafia and police encounters to neutralize the organized crime syndicate . Unbiased view towards the issue was the major positive of the documentary , at first it explores the rise of D Company and how cruel they were , which caused chaos in streets of Mumbai , to neutralize them cops chose the violence in which they ended up exploiting their authority , same time it shows how annoying and opportunistic the media are . Docu mostly shows the cops side of the story and how they became heroes of the country by encountering the criminals and at end how they became villians for there fake encounters .

Overall , documentary discusses the known incidents and facts that took place in two decades in 1hr 30mins . If you have less idea about the D Company crime syndicate and police encountering that took place in 90s and early 2ks of Mumbai then kindly give it a try . Worth watching .

Like theres no end to crime anywhere, and where it eventually worked for a while fighting bad with bad and worst for worst, they eventually got punished and dolloped with by their own. Cause mumbai police force encounters, or may i say enforcers, cause it was that their real mission was, upon criminal organisations and terrorists had an asphyxiating effect , and made mumbai for a period become a silent town crimewise...

quite unheard of really for western ears and eyes , giving a task force carte blanche authority over life, death and justice. And that really ruined their tactics, when an article in time magazine told the story about them dirty harry's of mumbai.

So crime came back, and are still ruling the streets of mumbai...

as a documentary production its a historical testament of mumbai, a city of dirt and chaos, where i least of all wouldve acted as a policeman. They use loads of media reels, and interviews, but the historians and humanists are oblivious. I do also miss mentioning of the mumbai hotel terror attack of 201?, that mustve had links to the d-company of gangsters. And in the end must be mentioned the lack of a pure time line, especially the latter third of the film...

but its a well made film on its premisses, the grumpy old man who hasnt and wouldnt visit mumbai, will recommend a view, its raw nature of crime shown en masse'.