The posters of this film had a tag line "An edge of the seat thriller by the producer of A Wednesday" and they were also designed in a style reminding you of that path breaking film of 2008 right away. The artwork had two men standing against each other just like A Wednesday with a strong common factor of Naseeruddin Shah catching your instant attention as desired. So the first job to make the viewers interested in this not so big, off beat kind of thriller was well done by the makers and a particular section did become eager to watch it expecting another fine film from the same production house as conveyed.
But unfortunately, JOHN DAY scores very less as a gruesome crime thriller and serves you nothing electrifying in this particular genre to fulfill the expectations raised. It begins on a very slow, calm and uninteresting note with no gripping sequences coming in for a very long time. As a result, all excitement is lost within the first 30 minutes itself, which was not really expected from the makers of A Wednesday. The pace is too lazy till the interval and the film simply fails to establish any kind of connect with the viewers waiting for something explosive. Post interval too the actors keep suffering due to the bad script but the pace does pick up in its last 30 minutes, which thankfully offer you something to keep sitting in the theater. Otherwise it remains a pretty avoidable venture throughout wasting the volcanic talent of Naseer along with all the other known actors in the star-cast.
Playing the tough, corrupt cop, Randeep does try to put up an intense show with few of his cruel scenes, including the one wherein he eats out the tongue of a criminal and another where he simply smashes the face of an informer like a mashed-up apple. But surprisingly, the same cannot be said about Naseeruddin Shah who simply plays it just like another unimportant assignment accepted in his available time. The supporting cast gives you nothing great to mention specifically, except Vipin Sharma who once again sends up a clear reminder to the industry that he is simply waiting for that one life-transforming role to showcase his unexplored skills eagerly.
Rightly made as a song-less venture, both its background score and camera work try real hard to give you a feeling of watching something off-beat, moving ahead of the usual crime thrillers on the lines of A Wednesday. But in absence of anything substantial in its script, content or execution, they are not able to save the film from sinking and all we have is only few engaging moments towards the end and nothing more than that. The suspense build up fails to keep you glued and the revelations are not made in any convincing style which ideally form the backbone of an exciting crime thriller talking about conspiracies. Interestingly as a first, the project has a 'Smoking Warning' displayed throughout the film till the end which is indeed a debatable way to tackle the Censor restrictions put on the issue.
Now coming to the key negative feature of JOHN DAY, the film is once again an unofficial rip-off from a Spanish film LA CAJA 507 or BOX 507 released in 2002. Honestly, a few scenes directed by the debutant Ahishor Solomon are comparatively more engaging than the original movie. Yet they cannot be presented as an excuse or argument supporting any 'copy-act' like this at all. Actually, the moment one comes to know about the copied status of such a film, all its (few) merits turn into demerits and you are not able to praise any kind of superlative effort made by the director whole heartedly. Ahishor has got the talent and he can surely come up with a gripping crime thriller as his next in all possibilities. But talking about his present JOHN DAY, it doesn't deliver what it promises in its promotional campaign and posters, so better watch it when its there on the TV channels in a few weeks time and play it safe.
