Piku (2015)

Hypochondriac Bhaskor Banerjee (Amitabh Bachchan) and his daughter Piku (Deepika Padukone) set off together on a trip from New Delhi to Kolkata. ­Irrfan Khan plays Rana, their designated driver, who soon grows weary of the constantly quarrelling pair.

The film, directed by Shoojit Sircar, focuses on Banerjee’s obsession with his digestive system, which disrupts his daughter’s life in many ways and sabotages any potential relationship she might embark on. The three stars are wonderful, especially when playing off each other. Bachchan is outstandingly as a waspish, self-centered father, Padukone plays the loving but frustrated daughter to perfection and Khan nails it as the bemused, irritated outsider who’s stuck in the middle of a dysfunctional family.

Mr and Mrs Iyer (2002)

A road trip set against the grim backdrop of Hindu-Muslim riots. When Hindu extremists stop a bus and search for Muslims on-board, devout Hindu Meenakshi Iyer (Konkona Sen Sharma) tries to protect Raja (Rahul Bose), a Muslim photographer in the seat next to her, by saying he is her husband, sparking an unlikely relationship between two people with nothing in common. Equally intriguing are the reactions of other passengers to the violence unfolding around them, which underscore the country’s rich culture and diverse religious practices. Directed by Aparna Sen.

Honeymoon Travels Pvt Ltd (2007)

Six couples on a bus trip from Mumbai to Goa provide the fodder for this quirky film that touches on a range of relationship issues, from marriage to unrequited love. As the bus judders down long potholed roads, negotiating challenges including flat tyres and a mysterious man on a motorbike, each couple makes startling discoveries about themselves and their fellow travellers. Directed by Reema Kagti, the film was one of the new wave of small independent films of the time that dared to depart from the standard Bollywood formula.

Bombay to Goa (1972)

Another Mumbai to Goa journey featured in one of Bollywood’s first road-trip movies, which was directed by S Ramanathan. Mala (Aruna Irani) witnesses a murder and boards a bus to escape the killers on her trail. Amitabh Bachchan – playing one of her fellow bus passengers – is part of an ensemble cast that includes some of Bollywood’s best comedians, including Mukri, playing a loud Tamilian, and Mehmood as the bus driver, whose friendship with the conductor (Anwar Ali) is based around the fact that their names, “Rajesh” and “Khanna”, combine to form the name of the era’s top ­superstar.