Albert Pinto Ko Gussa Kyon Aata Hai (1980)

Mirza later acknowledged that the film, which addresses India’s minorities, is set in a catholic Bombay milieu because at the time he lacked the courage to deal with Muslim issues (this he did later in his Salim Langde Pe Mat Ro, 1989). Albert Pinto (Shah) is a garage mechanic from Goa who dreams of owning the expensive cars he drives for clients. His girlfriend Stella (Azmi) upsets him with her casual and pragmatic attitude to his colleagues as well as to their employer’s sexual interest in her. Albert’s father (Deshpande) joins a textile workers’ strike and stimulates his son’s political awareness. Mirza wanted the film to be acceptable to the mainstream Hindi cinema and to that end included some songs e.g. the scene of the garage workers praising an expensive car, Paanch lakh ki gaadi hai (‘The car costs 500,000 rupees’), shot in a single take. Several characteristic Mirza sequences are introduced into the film, such as the hero examining himself in a mirror, or the workers being searched as they leave the factory (shot with a concealed camera).