Phone Booth is a fast-paced action thriller that is only 1 hour and 15 minutes long. Also, the movie was filmed in 10 days flat.
It features Colin Farrell whose character is that of an arrogant publicist and as the movie progresses, we are subject to Farrell’s character, a deeply flawed one, coming undone. All his falsehoods are stripped away and we realise that his life is basically a sham. Maybe I am the odd man out, the one person who finds a deeper meaning in an action movie, most of it shot within the confines of a phone booth.
In short, Farrell is forced to reassess his life and confront his reality, which is basically a persona he has created to make himself look more important than he really is.
There is an old Michael Jordan commercial where he questions if he will still love basketball without the sideshows and the distractions that accompany fame.
Whenever I see arrogance, nonchalance and abuse of power, the first question that comes to my mind is ‘what will that person be once they fall off the false pedestal they have put themselves on?’
It’s hard for a dashing sports star to see that one day their glory days will wind down and they will be struggling to keep up with the next generation of stars.
It’s hard for the politician blinded by power to realise that one day they will no longer be in power.
It’s hard for the leader who uses their position to intimidate and instill fear to see that people are not truly respecting them but are wary of their authority.
In all of the above cases, people have got carried away by the temporary power that their position has bestowed on them or they have created a world for themselves where they believe they are more important than they really are.
Throughout my career, I have always been fascinated by the hanger on (the Indian term for them is chela), people who get their false sense of power by associating with someone in power. The only question I have when I see these people is — ‘who are they without proximity to a person of importance’?
A lot of what we say and do and the way we conduct ourselves is sometimes built on numerous falsehoods, just like Colin Farrell’s character in Phone Booth.
Too many side-shows and externals can cause us to become caricatures, forgetting who we really are.
I believe we all have our ‘Phone Booth’ moments where we are humbled and put in place. Some of us learn from these and become better people and some others become even worse.
One way to avoid drowning in our own falsehoods is to have honest people around us who will call us out when we’re acting stupid. This is also one reason why many leaders find it tough to change — they don’t surround themselves with people who can tell it to them as it is.
What falsehood about yourself can you bring down today?
P.S. The movie Phone Booth was shot using the technique called ‘French hours’. It basically means there is no fixed time for lunch and the crew continues to shoot and grabs a bite whenever they find the time. This allows for the shoot to continue without any major breaks, resulting in more work getting done in a short span of time.
There is also a lesson in this — if there is a task or project that you want to get done quickly, you can use the ‘French hours’ concept.
