The surprising nature of a good thriller and how effectively and how long it keeps its audience interested with it during its run duration are signs of a good thriller. The film ‘A Thursday,’ directed by Behzad Khambata and starring Yami Gautam Dhar, checks most of the boxes for what constitutes an excellent thriller.
Gautam portrays Naina, a pre-primary school teacher who chooses to hold her 16 kids hostage one Thursday. She contacts the local police station and threatens to kill her captives, including a student’s chauffeur and a school aide, on an hourly basis if her demands are not satisfied.
The Yami Gautam-led A Thursday is a spiritual sequel to Neeraj Pandey’s sleeper smash A Wednesday!, which debuted in 2008. Both Ronnie Screwvala films depict a vigilante who creates a hostage scenario, trapping the police and the government at the highest levels for a just cause exposed at the end.
The Disney+ Hotstar film stars Gautam as Naina, a playschool teacher in Mumbai who kidnaps children and demands five crores in exchange for a meeting with the Prime Minister, played by Dimple Kapadia. Catherine Alvarez (Neha Dhupia) and her subordinate Javed Khan are the cops on the case (Atul Kulkarni). Catherine and Javed share an unusual relationship. When the screenplay by director Behzad Khambata and co-writer Ashley Lobo provides pregnant Catherine with some hasty ways to deal with Naina, it’s difficult to discern who’s boss, allowing Javed to lecture Naina about policing and parenthood.
A Wednesday! is remembered for its two strong lead performances by Naseeruddin Shah and Anupam Kher. Their banter as vigilante and officer was one of the film’s highlights. The picture also benefited from two excellent supporting performances by Aamir Bashir and Jimmy Sheirgill. They played a level-headed officer and an aggressive young guy, respectively. The notion was also new.
The South Korean film The Terror Live took a similarly unusual approach to the concept. Its Hindi counterpart, Dhamaka, which was released in November of last year, was significantly inferior.
So, how does A Thursday perform?
It’s a passable vigilante film, with the tense atmosphere provided by the idea itself as a positive. The constant rain adds to the gloomy atmosphere.
What are its drawbacks? Several.
Gautam, whose mentally sad character, portrays Naina as a horror film villain, which is not her fault. This is how the writer-director envisioned the character since there are multiple scenes of Gautam growling and staring at the camera, with quick zoom-ins and a horror-movie soundtrack tossed in to sell her like a mad lady.
Throughout the film, Kulkarni is overdramatic and hammy, making every attempt to look the part: a rugged, world-weary officer with a cigarette dangling from his lips. On the other hand, Dhupia is subtle and tries her best with a thankless job.
In the case of Kapadia, in a post-Modi India, such a novice Prime Minister who is easily pushed into seeming weak in public by her advisers, the press, and some random vigilante is difficult to buy. The journalists can even approach her and ask her questions. I mean, have you not learnt anything from Narendra Modi?
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A Thursday review:
Atul Kulkarni and Neha Dhupia in a movie still, the script isn’t very memorable, which is surprising. The man in charge is Vijay Maurya, who penned the exquisite Bambaiya Hindi lines for Gully Boy. However, he also authored Radhe.
Khambata, who earlier helmed the thriller Blank (2019), starring Sunny Deol and Dimple Kapadia’s son, is a master of scene-setting. Naina must fight off her only two adult hostages to obtain her pistol in the film. In comp, it’s a fairly innovative sequence.
Some of the film’s poor points in the screenplay also hurt its chances. For example, while the hostage scenario unfolds, Naina is live-streaming her views on her smartphone. They severed Naina’s internet and television connections just before the cops were about to charge in. However, she regains access to WiFi by using one of her hostage’s phones. Why not simply disconnect the entire area’s internet connection?
And the film’s take on the news media is just amusing. This is a common blunder in Hindi cinema. It’s one thing to demonstrate that all journalists are crooked, TRP-hungry, and inept. But, at the very least, pay attention to the details. That will just make your journalists appear much nastier. Even hours after Naina started her mission when the entire country appeared to be outraged with her, the news stations are merely busy moralising, going all how-could-she? Why haven’t they unearthed her full past and disgraced her yet? How come reporters aren’t bugging her parents, fiance, and other family members? Twitter would take 30 minutes to learn about her and her extended family, which stretches back five to six generations.
Even the police take hours to discover her family and learn about Naina’s history, occurring at least 90 minutes into the film. In a state of national emergency, it’s strange to assume that the whole security establishment can’t devise a real means to neutralise such a non-threat. It’s best to just go back and watch A Wednesday again!
