Vishwaroopam : Form well ‘Magnified’

“He is neither a slave of any

Nor, a King

He passes the forest

Let the serenity be…”

My own (so-called) poetic translation of my favorite lines from the magnum opus ‘Vishwaroopam’. The lines themelf says my entire feel about the movie. Last night, I squeezed 3 difficult hours from my recent past to get a meaning out of it and rightly so. Before I begin, please, I am neither a staunch Kamal fan nor a only-classic-movie watcher. My knowledge about the art of film making is still a drop in the ocean and I have lots of commercial flicks favorites too. I don’t fall in any particular category myself. Hence, the following shall be called as more of a personal opinion rather review. You have all the rights to agree / dis-agree.

Without dwelling in to story, let me jump in to categorized feedback on the movie

Positives:

Kamal Hassan, apparently he did multiple roles apart being a lead actor. With added burden of being a producer and director, he did a fair justice to all the roles. Ofcourse, the stand out part is acting and the transformation from each outlook & the body language to the other was immaculate. One can see he took every pain he could possibly take to deliver the best even for minor sequence. Be it dancing kathak or training an army. Hez always a student and teacher. The fact only gets imminent.

Stunts carry a special mention. In the middle of the movie I told my mate that this movie can be showcased along with main stream Hollywood spy-thriller movies on-par with quality. The ware house stunt was a WOW moment. The BGM and kamal’s expression during the stunt added the perfect flavors to one of the best stunts of Indian cinema.

It is important that one should give attention to the dialogues of any kamal’s movie. This one is no different. I liked many one-liners from kamal and some sarcastic statements too. Though I wont completely appreciate the sarcasm bit, I still like the intelligence behind it. However, I enjoyed the dialogues about god and tickling-wits before the warehouse stunt.

The backdrop itself is quiet new to tamil cinema. The Newyork-Afganistan combination is definitely new and gives a different frame of mind to viewers which is good. The mountains of Afghanistan were nicely shot and cinematographer deserve a pat on the back.

The no-run-on-the-mill songs factor is for sure a good change. Such a plot absolutely doesn’t need any songs and kamal used his intelligence good enough to gel most of the songs along with the story line. I believe the opening kathak dance song too is made intentionally to give a pleasant opening and finish off the only dedicated song before the story even begins. My favorite is the title song itself aptly fitted during warehouse stunt (sorry about repeated ‘warehouse stunt’ but I cannot take it out of my mind : ))

Negatives:

The dragging screen play at times lets one down. However, its not significant compared to other positives of the movie.

Some of the sequences run just too fast for ordinary viewers like me to understand. It takes some intelligence to put the pieces together. Sometimes, I am confused if it’s really a logic issue or am I not paying attention to the details.

Overall, this movie is a must watch for adults and adults only. I wont suggest this to any kids due to violence content. Kamal Hassan is doubtlessly an enigma trying his best to raise the movie standards to take it on par with world’s bests. He took a meaningful content and made a thriller out of it. Watch the movie with open mind and appreciate the positives of it (which many modern day Indian movies truly lag).

Now, am gonna list out some of the analysis (with my little wisdom) that I made. If you haven’t watched the movie yet, you better stop reading and proceed to email or comment me about your opinions : )

Analysis:

These may not be right, these are what I think knowing Kamal’s way of cinema : )

The pigeons somehow become a highlight in posters, trailers and movie. Is it used intentionally as pigeons carry a universal meaning of peace thus conveying this movie is more about the peace than terrorism?

The sequence where the son of Omar says ‘stop, I am not a kid’ and leaves the swing where his elder brother asks for a swing ride help from wasim. This is a good projection of how the lesser aged kid wanted to pursue a meaningful future and how his elder brother brain washed to be remain as a kid forever.

The 2 seconds shot where an insect comes out of a gun point. I fail to understand what it tries to convey. Is that supposed to mean that the victims are like insects who has no idea about the danger of weapons but lives with it as they have no choice and idea about world other than weapons?

The scene where Wasim and his assistant gets in to an argument. When wasim says ‘Allah will not forgive us’, his assistant replies ‘he wont forgive you, imtiaz is only a nick name I don’t belong to the religion’. Nice projection of his intention, its not religion that should be dictating good or bad, its supposedly karma.

The climax scene where the terrorist prays inside the room to get Allah’s blessing to explode the bomb successfully while wasim prays outside the room to same Allah, seeking his blessing to save the world. Kudos !!!

One big clarification I need. A RAW agent primary task is to protect India and shouldn’t be engaged in a mission to save other countries from terrorism or is it a joint mission from top agencies in the world to protect world itself ? May be its indicated in the movie but I didn’t noticed ?

Why Why Why Kamal repeatedly showering his sarcasm on this particular community of Hindus ? I noticed in many movies. Being atheist is his personal choice it may be correct or harmless to him but why should he insult the customs and procedures of others when it is doing no harm ? Am I missing anything here ? The reason that he himself is part of the community doesn’t give him any rights to hurt them with out any justification. This is part of my concern about Kamal himself too.