When real life problems are portrayed on celluloid, it can make for an intriguing watch or a callous take of reality. Chhodo Kal Ki Baatein is true to its intent and does not indulge in popular gimmicks to drive home an ideology. Work and all work is not what life is meant for, it is the finer things that matter most. Pramod Joshi, a Marathi filmmaker of repute, ropes in the talented Sachin Khedekar and the versatile veteran Anupam Khar in central characters to make a film that intends to harp on the fact that ego, being workaholic, pursuit of materialistic happiness and ignorance of immaterial care towards emotions are not what life is all about.

Sachin Khedekar is a man who apparently lives his job. Work for him is everything that he has in life despite having a caring wife and a child. He wants everything under the sun but love, fun, good times and a life is not what his focus is. His wife walks out on him and he is left alone to have a ball in his frustrations. Chhodo Kal Ki Baatein takes a unique tweaking at this stage and pulls in a time loop. Sachin is caught in a time loop wherein everyday is Sunday and he just cannot make any sense of all that is happening with him. Enters the wise blind man (Anupam Kher) who prods the protagonist to learn the subtleties of life and teaches him what should be ideally desirable and what is normally desired by man.

Pramod Joshi tries to hammer his points into the audiences’ mind. Chhodo Kal Ki Baatein has a lot of lessons for almost everybody in today’s world but the scenes and the manner in which the director preaches the ideals could have been better if they were a little more subtle. There is a lot that has been packed into Chhodo Kal Ki Baatein and as a result, for the common man, things may get confusing at several instances. Anyone who wants to base a film on a philosophy needs to get a little educative in the narrative but the medium should be lucid, at the least.

Sachin Khedekar impresses in a few scenes but overall, he has not been put to a great use. There are very few variations in his expression. Possibly, the brief that he received from the director was to look grim, angry and frustrated throughout the film. Anupam Kher is not exploited properly. Not only is his back story kept a secret or unintentionally not explained but his character also does not come out as convincingly as it should have.

Chhodo Kal Ki Baatein is a good one time watch for people who would not mind to catch actors with a paunch and a bald head speaking sense on screen and not gyrating their way to some uncanny climax. One would have to be attentive to get all the different emotions that Pramod Joshi tries to play with. Two things that could have been done better with the film – the plot could have been boiled down to a few motives than hovering across several pathos of professional and soulless life and the item number was absolutely not necessary. Other than that, there aren’t many drawbacks of Chhodo Kal Ki Baatein. It may just raise a few questions in your mind and have some food for thought but the film as a whole would not have a haunting or a long lasting effect.

Probably, our minds have become like Sachin’s where we do not care about ideals, soul searching and are weak to give up our desires.