The underwhelming idiots

KATHMANDU, JAN 05 - Take an engineering genius who thinks students should be ‘educated’ and not taught, a neurotic dean who believes his 32 years of experience in teaching leaves nothing for him to learn, and an inspiring story of ‘fighting against the system’, and you get 3 Idiots, a supposed-adaptation of the book Five Point Someone that is going to leave expectant moviegoers underwhelmed.

3 Idiots begins much the same way Five Point Someone does: by showing the ragging that goes on at even India’s most prestigious colleges. The protagonist, Aamir Khan in the movie, enters by defeating the abusers and standing up for fellow new students. Rancho (Aamir Khan), Farhan (R Mahadevan), and Raju (Sharman Joshi) are new students at the elite Imperial College of Engineering, among the 200 chosen from the 400,000 applicants. While Farhan and Raju intend to spend the four years in college like everyone else, Rancho plans to do things differently. He is an antithesis to the bookish knowledge-driven system, and argues, rather unsuccessfully with his dean, that the college should teach more practical knowledge to the students.

Then follows the rather lengthy Harry Potter-esque exploits by Raju and his friends: taunting the faculty without regards to the consequence, asking questions which would be easily answered in real life, but stump the professors in the movie and win cheers from classmates, and stealing exam papers from the Dean’s office. Despite some interesting sub-plots and story arcs, anyone who has watched the Munnabhai films or read Five Point Someone is going to be disappointed by the antics, and feel that justice has not been done to the book. Several scenes are straight out of the book, even though director Raj Kumar Hirani claims only five percent of the film is based on the book and refuses to give credit to its author, Chetan Bhagat. The three main characters in the film are indistinguishable from the book’s main protagonists, and other major characters — including the dean — clearly been derived from the book

Fortunately, the cast has done a commendable job of bringing an otherwise mediocre story to life. Boman Irani, named Virus by his students, is eerily convincing as an experienced teacher who, after bringing out generations of students, is convinced that he is rarely wrong. Mahadevan, and Joshi very accurately portray the friends of Rancho, a genius who tops his exams without studying. Aamir Khan, though, needs to look for more challenging and diverse roles, and quit taking a role just because it gives him the opportunity to become the ‘cool dude’.

The combination of Khan, and Rajkumar Hirani of Munnabhai fame, should have produced a historical film. Add to that the story of Bhagat’s bestselling novel, and the film should have been a trend-setter, creating new genre by itself, paving way for experimentation, and encouraging more movie adaptation of books in Bollywood. Something has gone wrong, because 3 Idiots is irritatingly moralising, and has a jaded story and plot worthy only of Ekta Kapoor. Despite all this, the film must be given credit for being inspirational and it does have fantastic songs and music. The biggest loser in all this is Bhagat himself, who has not only not been given credit, but also has lost any possibility of creating a true film adaptation of his novel.

Despite its weaknesses, the film has sold well, breaking several records, thanks to Hirani’s and Khan’s past records, and the presence of actors like Irani, Mahadevan, and Kareena Kapoor. Khan and Hirani, though, have squandered their reputation, and moviegoers are bound to think more than once before watching their upcoming works. This film shows when given enough time and money, even Aamir Khan can lose his ‘cool’ image—he would do well if he tried to entertain more, rather than force-feed unsubtle social messages. The characters in the film turn out not to be idiots after all, but looking at the mess they have created in the process, Khan and Hirani could very well be.