A Wednesday!
| A Wednesday | |
|---|---|
 Promotional poster for the film | |
| Directed by | Neeraj Pandey |
| Written by | Neeraj Pandey |
| Produced by | Ronnie Screwvala Shital Bhatia Anjum Rizvi |
| Starring | Anupam Kher Naseeruddin Shah Jimmy Shergill Deepal Shaw Aamir Bashir |
| Cinematography | Fuwad Khan |
| Music by | Sanjoy Chowdhury |
| Distributed by | UTV Motion Pictures |
Release date | 5 September 2008 |
Running time | 103 minutes |
| Country |  India |
| Language | Hindi |
A Wednesday (2008) is an Indian Hindi language thriller drama film written and directed by Neeraj Pandey. It stars Anupam Kher and Naseeruddin Shah in the lead roles and marks the return of the duo on screen after 12 years. The film depicts an about-to-retire Police Commissioner narrating a sequence of events that unfolded on a particular Wednesday and which do not exist in any written record, but only in his mind and in those of several individuals who were involved in it, both willingly and unwillingly, and how those events affected the lives of all the concerned people.
Plot
The film opens with the shots of Mumbai Police Commissioner Prakash Rathod taking a respite after a jog, describing in a voice-over that he is going to retire from office the following day, and how numerous people have been recently questioning him about the most challenging case he had to deal with in his entire career, and how he has been deliberately evading such questions. As his voice-over ends the film switches into a narrative, showing the events that occurred on a certain Wednesday, which the Commissioner specifically recalls when being asked the said question. An unnamed man is shown to strategically place a handbag, assumed to be carrying explosives, in the Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus railway station and proceeding to place another, under the false pretense of lodging an FIR, in the toilet of a police station located near the Mumbai Police headquarters. He then arrives on the rooftop of a building under construction where he has setup his base of operations, equipped with various modern technology gadgets and instruments. He calls up Rathod and informs him that 5 bombs have been placed in different locations throughout Mumbai, which are programmed to explode simultaneously within four hours unless the Commissioner gives in to his demands and releases four Islamic militants, Ibrahim Khan, Ikhlaque Ahmed, Mohd. Zaheer and Khurshid Lala, who have been involved in and arrested for many of the major terrorist attacks and activities that have happened in the city since the previous decade. In response, Rathod immediately alerts his team involved in intelligence research and surveillance, tapping all the available resources in gathering preliminary information and tracing the location of the caller. Meanwhile, the caller tips off television news reporter Naina Roy, telling her to reach the police headquarters immediately as it is going to be "the most important day of her life". Rathod initially suspects the anonymous caller to be bluffing, but his doubts are dispelled as the caller, to prove his seriousness and the police force's helplessness, reveals that a bomb has been planted in the police station right opposite to the Police headquarters. He tries to trigger the bomb through a cell phone, but it is located in the nick of time and defused, just as Roy reaches the scene on the caller's instructions and reports about the situation.
Rathod then cleverly uses Roy to fake a report on live television that the four terrorists have been released and are being relocated at an undisclosed common site, turning the caller's tool back onto him. Rathod's men find out that the caller is using advanced software to automatically switch the numbers and locations of his mobile phone SIM card every minute, rendering their manpower and the obsolete equipments useless and prompting them to employ the services of a young hacker. In the meantime, Rathod is also able to obtain a facial composite of the caller with help of the police officer to whom the caller had approached to lodge the fake FIR during the earlier scenes of the film; but much of the time passes without any concrete results on the identity or the location of the caller. Ultimately, Rathod agrees with the caller's demand and puts two of his best men, Arif Khan and Jai Singh, in charge of handing over the four terrorists at the Juhu Aviation Base airstrip. Once there, the caller confirms the identity of all the four men via a conference call with Arif and Rathod, and then asks Arif and Jai to unlock their handcuffs and leave them alone at a particular spot. Rathod orders his men to do as told but at the last moment, Arif decides not to hand over Ibrahim Khan to ensure all the information regarding the locations of the bombs can be forced out from the caller. Jai aruges with Arif and demands he do as ordered but Arif forcefully grabs the terrorist and starts walking away. As they leave behind the remaining three, the caller, unaware of the ongoing fiasco, uses a cell phone placed under a rigged bench at the spot to detonate an explosion in which all the three terrorists perish. Arif relays this information to Rathod, which is confirmed by the anonymous caller as he reveals that he is just a "stupid common man", not belonging to any terrorist outfit, and his plan was not to free the terrorists but to kill them, avenging all the terrorist attacks they had helped carry out in Mumbai and other major cities of India, specifically for the 2006 Mumbai train bombings, thus "cleansing the roach-infested house". Rathod tries to reason with him but then the caller threatens to blow up the remaining bombs across the city unless Arif and Jai kill Ibrahim Khan. Rathod discusses this with the state's Chief Minister and his deputy, coming to a conclusion that the situation is just an "accident", and orders his men to kill the terrorist. As Roy reports the scene on television, the young hacker traces the caller's location and Rathod leaves abruptly towards the site.
The caller calls up Rathod, as he is en route, for a final time to further reveal that he had not planted any other bomb in the city. Rathod reaches the caller's location just as the latter is leaving the place, having destroyed all his gadgets and equipments, leaving behind no evidence. The two meet briefly when Rathod, identifying the anonymous caller on the basis of the face sketch, offers the man a ride home and introduces himself. The film freezes momentarily just as the man begins to smile and utter his name, when Rathod's voice-over cuts back as he says the man told him his real name but he doesn't wish to reveal it since anyone will look for a religious basis in it. The film ends on an idealistic note, with Rathod admitting that they all knew the common man was disturbed because of the insecure environment and the incompetence of the governing authorities but he never imagined him to go to such lengths and have the guts to do something like that. He also repeats that the facts of this incident cannot be found in any written record but only in the memories of those who actually witnessed it, and acknowledges that although the incidence has ambiguous moral significance, he personally feels that whatever happened, happened for the best.
Cast
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Anupam Kher | Prakash Rathod |
| Naseeruddin Shah | The Common Man/The Anonymous Caller |
| Deepal Shaw | Naina Roy |
| Jimmy Shergill | Arif Khan |
| Aamir Bashir | Jai Singh |
| K. P. Mukherjee | Ibrahim Khan |
| Rohitashy Gaur | Ikhlaque Ahmed |
| Vije Bhatia | Mohd. Zaheer |
| Mukesh Bhatt | Khurshid Lala |
Reception
A Wednesday got strong positive reviews and critical acclaims, particularly for its storyline. The lead actors, especially Naseeruddin Shah and Anupam Kher were praised for their portrayals. It also generated respectable box-office collections and was appreciated by the audiences.
Reviews
- Subhash K. Jha, newkerals.com, August 27 2008, "Anupam Kher impresses Narendra Modi with 'A Wednesday'"
- Elvis D'Silva, Rediff India Abroad, September 5 2008, "Watch Wednesday"
- Nikhat Kazmi, The Times of India, September 5 2008, "A Wednesday - Best shot by Anupam Kher and Naseeruddin Shah"
- Gaurav Malani, The Economic Times, September 5 2008, "A Wednesday: Movie Review"
- Rajeev Masand, IBN Live, September 6 2008, "Masand's Verdict: Any day, watch A Wednesday"
- Nikhat Kazmi, The Times of India, September 5 2008, "A Wednesday"
- Nikhil Kumar, ApunkaChoice.com, "'A Wednesday' -Could make your day"
- A Common Man, [1], "'A Wednesday' - A Story of an Aaam Aadmi that gives you the feel of Freedom!. A must watch movie!"
Errors in the Film
The director has not given any chance to the viewers to detect any flaw in the movie. However, it has one.
When Jai and Arif are on their way to Juhu Aviation Base alongwith the terrorist, the former receives a call from his wife informing him that she is on her way home. Alongwith this she also tells him that there exists a lot of police movement on the railway station. During this scene, when Jai's wife is walking on the Foot Over Bridge (FOB), the railway station that is being shown on the screen is "BORIVALI". (Borivali is a suburb on the Western Railway line of the Mumbai City) However, just behind her, there exists an indicator hanging on the roof of the FOB which shows that a train for PL (PL abbreviates for Panvel, which is yet an another suburb on the Harbour Railway line of the Mumbai city) is about to arrive. To the best of the support that I get from my memory, I guess, there does not exist any train between Panvel and Borivali.