Karthik Calling Karthik
By Jaya Rao
March 18, 2010
UM| Rating: B-
Karthik Calling Karthik is a movie that is strictly ok, and that is because the plot builds up to a totally flat resolution in the end after steadily going uphill for 3 hours. It is about an IIM topper (Farhan Akhtar) who somehow ends up as a friendless peon working in a construction company. He also has a crush on a lovely coworker (Deepika Padukone) who does not even know he works at the company; much less that he has a crush on her. Very quickly in the story, Karthik receives a phone call that claims to be Karthik himself, and the voice on the phone claiming to be Karthik promises to turn loser Karthik’s life around until he is a winner. With nothing left to lose, the loser version of Karthik listens to the phone’s advice and turns his life totally around to a point where he gets the girl, has a great job, and an eerie dependency on having to come home and listen to this phone voice for an hour a night at 5am.
When Deepika’s character finds out about the phone calls, she insists that someone must be playing a joke on Karthik or that Karthik himself is just delusional, and the bulk of the rest of the story lies in our ability to imagine who the voice on the phone could possibly be. Every time we as the audience come to a conclusion, something in the movie would happen to show us that our assumption must be wrong. Unfortunately, the most obvious conclusion ends up being the right conclusion, and that is what makes this movie so disappointing.
The main appeal of this movie lies in being able to answer who is on the phone, but as Deepika’s lifeless performance and the increasingly irritating suspense stretch out over three hours, enthusiasm dwindles and then finally falls flat at the end once the big secret is out.
With the exception of Shankar Mahadevan singing Uff Teri Ada and Clinton Cerejo singing Hey Ya!, the soundtrack was nothing special. Having seen this movie in the theater myself, I would definitely recommend this movie as a rental instead.
Karthik Calling Karthik is a movie that is strictly ok, and that is because the plot builds up to a totally flat resolution in the end after steadily going uphill for 3 hours. It is about an IIM topper (Farhan Akhtar) who somehow ends up as a friendless peon working in a construction company. He also has a crush on a lovely coworker (Deepika Padukone) who does not even know he works at the company; much less that he has a crush on her. Very quickly in the story, Karthik receives a phone call that claims to be Karthik himself, and the voice on the phone claiming to be Karthik promises to turn loser Karthik’s life around until he is a winner. With nothing left to lose, the loser version of Karthik listens to the phone’s advice and turns his life totally around to a point where he gets the girl, has a great job, and an eerie dependency on having to come home and listen to this phone voice for an hour a night at 5am.
When Deepika’s character finds out about the phone calls, she insists that someone must be playing a joke on Karthik or that Karthik himself is just delusional, and the bulk of the rest of the story lies in our ability to imagine who the voice on the phone could possibly be. Every time we as the audience come to a conclusion, something in the movie would happen to show us that our assumption must be wrong. Unfortunately, the most obvious conclusion ends up being the right conclusion, and that is what makes this movie so disappointing.
The main appeal of this movie lies in being able to answer who is on the phone, but as Deepika’s lifeless performance and the increasingly irritating suspense stretch out over three hours, enthusiasm dwindles and then finally falls flat at the end once the big secret is out.
With the exception of Shankar Mahadevan singing Uff Teri Ada and Clinton Cerejo singing Hey Ya!, the soundtrack was nothing special. Having seen this movie in the theater myself, I would definitely recommend this movie as a rental instead.