HELLO – */5

If you are into reviewing movies, Hello is the kind of movie that you love, for different reasons altogether. It’s so bad in all aspects, and so sublime in its badness, u cant resist going all out at it. Here’s a bit of trivia. The book is based n the novel “One night at the call center”. Chetan Bhagat is not a literary genius, but to his credit, he has u hooked. I’d never go to watch a movie that stars Salman Khan, Sohail Khan and Amrita Arora, but I did it only when I learnt that Chetan Bhagat was doing the screenplay. Sadly, Hello is a disaster. The only good thing about watching the movie is that I get to review it, and I have a broader canvas, if you know what I mean!

Hello is the story of a few call center employees who are unsatisfied with their lives. As someone who has worked in call centers, the problem I’d had with the novel was that the BPO industry was paraded as a mecca for non-achievers, have-beens and useless people. Its certainly not the case. The characters in the film are pissed off with their lives till they get intervention in the form of a call from God. I do not have the patience to explain what happens before or after that. 

Coming back to the film, the trademark cynicism is missing. Director Atul Agnihotri doesn’t care if you like the characters or not. I cant say much about the performances because most of the star cast seems to be sleepwalking through the film. Sharman Joshi is the saving grace and seems to have a penchant for holding his own in otherwise bad films. This is one instance when I say don’t judge a book by its movie.