Cast: Sharman Joshi, Sohail Khan, Gul Panag, Isha Koppikar, Amrita Arora
Special Appearance: Salman Khan & Katrina Kaif
Direction: Atul Agnihotri
Music Director: Sajid-Wajid and Salim-Suleiman
Critics rating: *Release Date: October 10, 2008
I always wondered when audiences complained how cinematic adaptations of international bestsellers never reached up to the preconceived expectations of the literary work. Back in India we never encountered a similar scenario since filmmakers barely attempted adapting contemporary literature. But with Hello director Atul Agnihotri reinstated the theory of prose over picture.
Not that Chetan Bhagat’s novel One Night at a Call Centre was an exceptional piece of literary brilliance. Anyone who has read the book will consent that the writing was filmi to the core and always had the trappings of a Bollywood drama. But while interpreting the manuscript to screenplay, Agnihotri fails to capture the finer nuances of the writing.
Agnihotri composes a cinematic preface in the form of a garish Salman Khan item number. Khan substitutes for Bhagat’s presence in the novel and his chance meeting with a mysterious girl (Katrina Kaif) is upgraded from a train compartment to a helipad terminal. The girl barges from nowhere and insists on narrating a story. Sadly she gives away the climax before starting her story enlightening it’s about God’s phone-call to six call-centre employees.
The potential team leader of the call-centre group Shyam (Sharman Joshi) has recently broken off with colleague Priyanka (Gul Panag) who is on the verge of marrying an NRI. Varun (Sohail Khan) has a crush on ambitious Esha (Isha Koppikar) who is willing to compromise to any extent to make it big in the fashion world. Radhika (Amrita Arora) is a battered housewife and Military Uncle (Sharat Saxena) is estranged from his US-settled son. Like all employees they hate their boss Bakshi (Dalip Tahil) who has got notice to sack a sizeable chunk of the staffers.
Then one night they meet with an accident and while dangling for life, they get a call from God. What follows is a divine discourse on ethics, morals, self-confidence, et al as the prolonged lecture by the Lord is backed with background score derived from Aastha channel and Miraclenet. With an edified outlook the team gets back to work and solves their personal and professional issues before the strike of dawn. This includes getting Bakshi fired in an unbelievably childish approach and saving their own jobs by increasing call volumes through the most ludicrous methods. They spread rumours of a dangerous virus attack to their US customer base (who are reduced to a bunch of incognizant buffoons seeking advice on starting computers or switching off vacuum cleaners) and they panic as if their country was threatened by some alien attack.
Three more writers (other than Bhagat) are employed to pen additional screenplay and dialogues but they only end up tampering the original essence of the book. A highpoint of the literature was how Shyam migrates from the present to his flashback romantic episodes with Priyanka through common connecting elements. The modified screenplay of the film clearly fails to tap that aspect of the novel. Rather what is added is a bald animated inner-soul of Shyam who provokes him into devilish ways. Not to forget the script is crammed with abstract club numbers having multi-coloured airborne models but the outcome is certainly not in flying colours.
The foreign fiancée struggles to fake an anglicized accent while the call centre operators bear none. Sohail Khan serves a sermonizing session on how celebrities are not the real youth icons while elder brother Salman Khan is used to same effect in his topless introductory item number. And what was Arbaaz Khan doing in the film? The characterizations are absolutely shallow and so are the performances.
One Night at a Call Centre was a passable fiction but Hello just made me dislike the novel. Certainly this ‘Hell’-o is not a ‘welcome’ sign.
News Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com
Posts
