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Ahmad works long hours as a street vendor selling coffee and pastries to New Yorkers from his push cart. A 30-second conversation is the extent of his relationship with his customers until he meets Mohammad, another Pakistani from Lahore. However, where Ahmad is struggling to save to buy his own cart, and an apartment for himself and his son, Mohammad is a wealthy New Yorker who decides to take Ahmad under his wing. Recognising Ahmad as a famous singer in Pakistan (Lahore 's answer to Bono), Mohammad tries to persuade the push cart man to relaunch his career. However, this isn't so easy for Ahmad who has been badly effected by a personal loss, and is confused by a city struggling to accept him.

Director Ramin Bahrani's third film (he wrote, directed and edited Man Push Cart), this one follows similar subject matter to Backgammon and Strangers, which also deal with issues of racial alienation and assimilation. An Iranian-American, Bahrani's films have previously focussed on Iranian and middle-eastern issues of identity, and he has said that Man Push Cart grew out of how he saw American reacting to the Muslim community after 9/11. The film was inspired by a friendship that Bahrani formed with Ahmad Razvi who worked as a push cart vendor and showed the director around his world for a year. Bahrani then surprised Razvi, who had never acted before, by asking him to be the star of his film.

Based on real events and using a non-professional lead, Man Push Cart has a strong thread of naturalism through it. As we follow Ahmad as he wakes before sunrise and goes home after dark, rarely do we as an audience also see daylight. Many of the scenes feature a repetition of Ahmad setting up the stall, taking it down or dodging the Manhattan traffic to wheel the cart to and from the lock-up. At night Ahmad paints Mohammad's apartment and is patronised by his success. When we find out Ahmad was a famous singer in Pakistan his life in the US seems that much more puerile and interminable.

In this way Bahrani effectively draws a sharp characterisation of a man who doesn't feel particularly drawn to his own culture (his Pakistani pop songs have been replaced by his friends who rap about life in New York), nor does he feel like embracing an American lifestyle (represented by the arrogant Mohammad) where he is confined to serving the needs of rich New Yorkers. Why are we breaking our backs working for ourselves? A friend asks Mohammad in relation to another who's gone on the payroll: "Working in Albany in Dunkin' Donuts, that's the life man".

Bahrani has said he is interested in telling a story that comes from real situations and based in location and character, rather than a fantasy world or a representation of what is real. He has certainly achieved a very solemn and serious work about disenfranchisement, and presented it in a bare and unglamorous light. He has found a remarkable actor in Razvi, who obviously drew on his own experiences for the role of Ahmad, and who has great presence for a first time actor.

Whilst the very reasons for its potent message and strong characterisations are Man Push Cart's strengths, they also occasionally work against it. The dialogue is minimal, the action often very repetitive and Ahmad's relationship with his own family only briefly explored. Whilst this makes his detachment all the more defined, it also has the effect of distancing us from these characters who occasionally suffer from a lack of animation or quirkiness that endears them to an audience.

In short, Man Push Cart is a sobering story of a man trying to make a living by starting at the bottom in a city where anything is possible but often comes at a high price. Bahrani's sense of realism is a strong stylistic element of the film, but can mean it is occasionally cold and unengaging.