In his new movie, Shoojit Sircar revisits ideas that he previously explored in Piku and October. I Want to Talk has a fractious father-daughter pair as well as an examination of the effects of long-standing illnesses on relationships.
Marketing executive Arjun (Abhishek Bachchan) refuses to let a cancer diagnosis defeat his spirit. Ritesh Shah’s screenplay, adapted from Arjun Sen’s memoir Raising a Father, examines Arjun’s efforts to endure repeated surgeries alongside maintaining a bond with his daughter Reya.
Reya, played by Pearle Dey and Ahilya Bamroo at different ages, has her own issues. As a child, she sees her father with a bandaged neck and a bruised manner. As an older woman, Reya must set aside her self-centredness to understand what her father is going through.
I Want to Talk is in both English and Hindi, in keeping with its California setting. The distance from Indian community networks emphasises Arjun’s loneliness.
The time he spends with Reya is often fraught. Arjun’s social circle comes to comprise the people he meets during his treatment. These include Johnny Lever, in a good-natured cameo as a medical attendant.
I Want to Talk wants to deliver an upbeat message about surviving cancer. Abhishek Bachchan has some sharp scenes, especially when Arjun is trying to put on his bravest face at his lowest ebb. Yet, the 122-minute movie is at odds with its intention, more effective when down-tempo than when trying to drum up the kind of doughty comedy that makes such films bearable.
But writer Ritesh Shah’s attempt at gallows humour is as clumsy as the movie’s title and as off-key as Arjun’s brittle jokes. Shah tries to replicate the meshing of plain speaking and poignant observations that screenwriter Juhi Chaturvedi achieved in Sircar’s Piku.
Shah does not always have the ear for the line that lands on target and then reverberates. Nor does the movie have scenes that stir the heart without overtly trying to. Arjun’s determination to go under the knife remains under-explained, while barely being motivational.
The scenes between Arjun and the older Reya have a stilted, garden-variety quality. The father-daughter relationship is more acutely observed when Reya is a little girl. Beautifully played by Pearle Dey, the younger Reya has a sensitivity that seems to vanish when she grows up.
Arjun has a better time with Jayanta, his consulting surgeon. Jayanta (Jayant Kripalani) has the ghoulish bedside manner of the medical professional who is so used to cutting up bodies that he has forgotten how to make small talk.
Why don’t you live your life or whatever is left of it, Jayanta cheerfully tells Arjun. Kripalani deftly navigates a character who comes off as inured to pain out of habit, rather than insensitivity.
The film is plainly shot and has a disjointed quality, working best when communication is kept to the minimum. Rather than a feel-good drama about triumphing over a debilitating condition, I Want to Talk is better placed to show us how serious aliments disrupt individuals and families.
The movie snaps into place when Arjun participates in a marathon. Here, Arjun’s life-long bravery, the physical effort this involves, and Abhishek Bachchan’s casting all pay off.
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‘Dealing with life lessons with a smile’: Shoojit Sircar on his new movie ‘I Want to Talk’