Karthik Calling Karthik Movie Review

Cast: Deepika Padukone, Farhan Akhtar, Shefali Shetty, Vipin Sharma
Director: Vijay Lalwani

For a substantial portion of Karthik Calling Karthik, writer-director Vijay Lalwani succeeds in keeping you reasonably intrigued. But this is not an easy film to appreciate.Farhan Akhtar stars as meek construction firm-employee Karthik Narayan who's bullied by his colleagues, tormented by his boss, and barely even noticed by the gorgeous co-worker he's got a crush on. When he suddenly starts receiving mysterious phone-calls from a person who claims to be Karthik himself, our hero finds it in himself to face the world. The voice on the other end empowers him to confront his oppressors and woo his girl. His life has clearly changed for the better, and he has those 5 am phone calls to thank. But when the caller is suddenly angered, Karthik's life begins to spiral downwards.

Part-office romance part-psychological study, Karthik Calling Karthik never quite succeeds in striking a consistent tone. Despite its promising premise, the film ultimately fails to work because of a clumsy screenplay that doesn't know which way to go. Despite its snail-like pace, you are hopeful the film will culminate in a thrilling discovery, but the central conceit is a disappointing letdown, not to mention impossibly far-fetched.

It's difficult to discuss the film's shortcomings in detail without giving away too much of its supposed suspense, but suffice to say the film isn't even faithful to its own logic. In its handling of a mental illness, Karthik Calling Karthik is naïve and superficial, and leaves more questions unanswered than addressed.

The romantic portions between Karthik and his colleague Shonali (played by Deepika Padukone) are engaging and entirely watchable because the director employs a contemporary, urban grammar in building their relationship. The same, unfortunately, can't be said for the film's second half in which Karthik heads off on a 'blind' journey to run away from his problems. The key issue here is that Lalwani reveals his suspense fairly early in the screenplay, and yet the film plods along tediously for another 45-odd minutes or so.

Of the leads, Farhan Akhtar seizes your attention as the mousy loser guy, but constructs what is ultimately an inconsistent character because of the shoddy script. Deepika Padukone is easy on the eye, but unconvincing as an ambitious architect, never once seen so much as discussing a building plan.

In the end, Karthik Calling Karthik appears confused and half-baked, and it commits that deadly unforgivable cinematic sin -- it bores you!