Taking ideas from films made in different languages and incorporating them in one’s own works is a practice followed extensively these days. However, the remakes also fail. One such remake was Vegam, directed by K. R Udhayashankar.
Vegam narrated the story of Ashwin, who is running an event management company and romances Archana. Ashwin has arrived in Malaysia for a meeting with Archana when he receives a call from a woman, crying for help. While initially, Ashwin thinks the conversation is a prank, he later realises the graveness of the situation after continuously getting calls.
These calls are from a housewife Selvi, who has been kidnapped with his son by a former cop, Sriman. Sriman is continuously asking for a tape from Selvi which she has no idea about. Sriman goes to the extent of breaking the telephone so that Selvi couldn’t ask for help from outside.
Selvi has somehow repaired the phone and connected to Ashwin, asking for help. Will Ashwin succeed in freeing Selvi and her son? Will Selvi’s abductors be arrested? These questions formed the crux of the story. Khushboo, Prabhu and Ashwin Shekhar comprised the cast of this film.
Despite a thrilling storyline, Vegam failed to entertain the audience. Each aspect of the film, i.e- acting, on-screen chemistry was criticised heavily. Critics and the audience lambasted the film, saying that it had no entertaining elements.
In stark contrast, Cellular — the original film that inspired Vegam — directed by David R Ellis was applauded tremendously. The amalgamation of superb action and nail-biting suspense made this film a favourite among cine-goers.
While in Vegam, nobody was appreciated for acting, in Cellular, the majority of actors were immensely admired. Kim Basinger was even a nominee for the best-supporting actress award for this film. Kim played the role of Jessica Martin. Besides Kim, Chris Evans, Jason Statham, William H. Macy and others were a part of this film.
