36 China Town

36 China Town is a Hindi English-language mystery thriller comedy film directed by Abbas-Mustan and produced by Subhash Ghai. It is an official adaption of the 1992 American film Once upon a Crime (which in turn is a remake of the 1960 Italian film Crimen).

The film stars an ensemble cast of Akshaye Khanna, Shahid Kapoor, Kareena Kapoor, Vivek Shauq, Upen Patel (of Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani fame, in his debut), Paresh Rawal, Payal Rohatgi, Johnny Lever and Tannaz Irani; while Isha Koppikar, Priyanka Chopra and Tanushree Dutta make special appearances and Aasif Sheikh Movie Maker The film follows the investigation of a police officer trying to find the killer of a wealthy casino owner, Sonia Chang.

Plot
The only child of millionaire Sonia Chang, Vicky has been kidnapped. To get her son back, she puts out a reward of 25 lakh Rupees. She lives in her huge mansion named "36 China Town" in Goa, with a housekeeper couple Mr. Lobo and Mrs. Lobo. Sonia is consoled by Rocky, a local.

Raj, a struggling actor and Priya, who ran away from home, meet each other. They find a child who appears to be all alone in Mumbai. They take pity on him, but after seeing a missing persons advertisement, they realise that the child is the son of Sonia Chang. Tempted by the reward money, they team up and decide to bring the child back home. Before leaving, they call Chang and tell her that they have her child. She was discussing the change in her will with her lawyer, Mr Dixit, when the duo inform her. Meanwhile, Raj starts falling in love with Priya.

Raj and Priya come to Goa, where they run into a drunkard loitering near Sonia's mansion. The drunkard runs away on seeing them. They are horrified to see Sonia dead. The duo run, but find that the child is left inside the mansion. Raj enters the mansion again to take him. He sees two eyes and legs behind a cupboard. Terrified, he gets out of the mansion with the child. Raj and Priya then inform Goa police about the murder. Raj and Priya go back to the mansion to take her suitcase. Raj is arrested by Inspector Karan. Raj refuses to name Priya. She takes Vicky to a church to drop him off but is seen by Rocky with the kid. Rocky calls the police. Priya also gets arrested and sent to jail. Priya and Raj become the prime suspects of the murder. Inside the jail, both fall for each other.

Karan calls Rocky to the police station. But seeing Rocky's eyes, Raj recollects that it was Rocky's eyes and shoes which he had seen behind the cupboard. Rocky then tells that he was in another room that night. He had found Sonia already murdered. Panicked, he was about to get out from the house when Raj and Priya entered and started searching for Sonia. Karan is able to reconstruct what actually happened that night. Based on Mr. Dixit's statement about the will and everybody's statement. First, he procures the drunkard, whom Raj and Priya believe to be the murderer. But, Karan goes on to explain that he is in fact, the kidnapper.

Karan explains that the kidnapper was hired by the killer but the kidnapper lost the child, who was then found by Raj and Priya in Mumbai. After Sonia is informed about the child's discovery, the killer murdered Sonia, while other people incriminated themselves through circumstances. The real killers are Mr. and Mrs. Lobo. According to Sonia Chang's initial will, after her death, the person who was most close to her son (which were her housekeepers) would inherit everything but then one day she found out about their evil intentions and decided to change her will, which led to them murdering her.

Raj and Priya are given custody of Vicky.

Cast

 * Akshaye Khanna as Chief Inspector Karan Kapoor
 * Shahid Kapoor as Raj Malhotra
 * Kareena Kapoor as Priya Singhania
 * Paresh Rawal as Natwar
 * Payal Rohatgi as Gracy, Natwar's wife
 * Johnny Lever as KK
 * Tannaz Irani as Ruby, KK's wife
 * Upen Patel as Rocky
 * Dinyar Contractor as Mr. Lobo
 * Roshan Tirandaaz as Mrs. Lobo
 * Raj Zutshi as Drunkard / Contract Killer
 * Vivek Vaswani as Mr. Dixit, Lawyer
 * Vivek Shauq as Inspector Ravi
 * Isha Koppikar as Sonia Chang (Special Appearance)
 * Priyanka Chopra as Seema Kapoor, Karan's wife. (Special Appearance)
 * Tanushree Dutta as Ayesha Dutta, in song Jab Kabhi. (Special Appearance)
 * Sambhavna Seth as Simran, Rocky's girlfriend.
 * Preeti Puri as Rosy
 * Nassar Abdullah as Raj's father

Awards and nominations
Winner
 * IIFA Awards for Best Debutant (Male) – Upen Patel
 * Zee Cine Award for Best Male Debut – Upen Patel
 * Global Indian Film Awards for Best Debut Actor – Upen Patel

Nominated
 * Filmfare Award for Best Female Playback Singer – Sunidhi Chauhan for "Aashiqui Mein Teri"
 * Star Screen Award for Most Promising Newcomer (Male) – Upen Patel

Soundtrack
The music was composed by Himesh Reshammiya. Lyrics were penned by Sameer. The music was released by Tips Music. According to the Indian trade website Box Office India, with around 12,00,000 units sold, this film's soundtrack album was the year's ninth highest-selling.

The song "Aashiqui Mein Teri" was remade as "Aashiqui Mein Teri 2.0" for Reshammiya's 2020 film Happy Hardy and Heer and is performed by Reshammiya and singer Ranu Mondal.