There have been too many headlines and too much fanfare about Vishwaroopam - Something Kamal fans are simply not used to. Controversy has always been his brother but it has never made his headlines. Neither in the past have people (who have surely not seen some of his finer attempts at cinema) come out dancing and jumping to watch a Kamal movie. Such behavior is usually associated with the films of his (artistically) poorer cousin - Rajnikanth.
There, therefore, is a need to talk some sense and talk some cinema about this movie and to keep apart the one line that almost all Vishwaroopam reviews seem to begin with - "there is nothing anti-Islam here". Yeah, yeah ok. We don't care. If he's decided to ridicule that faith, then so be it. It doesn't change the way one should review a work of creation or thought.
Vishwaroopam is a film that you wish were better made. What makes you wish so is the fact that it is actually a very well made movie and that the maker is capable of way greater heights. However Vishwaroopam's scale seems to be making a statement about the average Indian mind. A movie produced at a cost of Rupees 95 crore in India can not afford to be intelligent. It would leave the producer poorer by at least 50 crore rupees which is not a meager amount for a non-studio production.
That said, for a fleeting period of 30-35 minutes, an indulgent Kamal Haasan takes this thriller deep into Afghanistan and slows it down to a snail's pace, out of choice. That section of the film is an absolute pleasure to watch. As if symbolic of this decision, we have the scene of a young jihaadi suicide bomber wanting to live a lost childhood through a timeless swing. There Kamal scores and touches a raw nerve. Equally well shot is the build up to the arrival of the one and only - Osama Bin Laden. Kamal makes no fuss about declaring that one of (the face-less) Allah's faces is Laden himself and this face is a face of terror, murder, hatred and ill-will.
Vishwaroopam makes for a tremendous theoretical discussion where in we are dealing with the twin concepts of Jihaad and Islaam. Jihaad was born out of Islam. But is what the normal man today knows as terrorism justified to be included in the Jihaad framework? It is a question that Vishwaroopam asks too and almost dispassionately leaves the answer to the viewer - As dispassionate as Wiz/Wisam/Taufeeq - the Hero.
If the Muslims of Vishwaroopam are the ignorant and self proclaimed Jihaadis, the Hindu's are no less. In the tam-brahm heroine, Kamal has found a "back-door" entry into ridiculing the birdbrained practice called Brahminism (from a rationalists point of view, a lot of it is really really dumb) and he pulls it off quite well after his first attempt with Asin in Dashavatharam.
In making both the hero and the villain (played with a great punch by Rahul Bose in an extremely well written negative role - which is always the case with Kamal films) of the same faith, Vishwaroopam also draws upon a theme that Heyram had stressed more on - Muslims are an inseparable and undeniable part of Indian life. The Muslim will be your tailor, your best friend, he will rape and kill your wife, he will also save your life. In Vishwaroopam, its a simpler paradigm - He is the hero and he is the villain (a line Kamal himself says to Pooja Kumar in the movie)
That ways, to answer your question, Vishwaroopam is the hero and Vishwaroopam is the villain!!
PS: Any discussion on a Kamal movie that doesn't talk about Kamal - the actor does disservice to that movie. This performer has consistently managed to outdo himself every time he has been cast on screen. It is a quality very few have. In Vishwaroopam, the "method" is almost obvious. The last time I felt i could literally see a method actor in Kamal was way back in Aalavandhaan. It grew subtler with Heyram, Anbe Sivam and Virumandi but with Vishwanath (Wiz), this seems to have returned. It as usual is a complete pleasure to watch this veteran perform.
There, therefore, is a need to talk some sense and talk some cinema about this movie and to keep apart the one line that almost all Vishwaroopam reviews seem to begin with - "there is nothing anti-Islam here". Yeah, yeah ok. We don't care. If he's decided to ridicule that faith, then so be it. It doesn't change the way one should review a work of creation or thought.
Vishwaroopam is a film that you wish were better made. What makes you wish so is the fact that it is actually a very well made movie and that the maker is capable of way greater heights. However Vishwaroopam's scale seems to be making a statement about the average Indian mind. A movie produced at a cost of Rupees 95 crore in India can not afford to be intelligent. It would leave the producer poorer by at least 50 crore rupees which is not a meager amount for a non-studio production.
That said, for a fleeting period of 30-35 minutes, an indulgent Kamal Haasan takes this thriller deep into Afghanistan and slows it down to a snail's pace, out of choice. That section of the film is an absolute pleasure to watch. As if symbolic of this decision, we have the scene of a young jihaadi suicide bomber wanting to live a lost childhood through a timeless swing. There Kamal scores and touches a raw nerve. Equally well shot is the build up to the arrival of the one and only - Osama Bin Laden. Kamal makes no fuss about declaring that one of (the face-less) Allah's faces is Laden himself and this face is a face of terror, murder, hatred and ill-will.
Vishwaroopam makes for a tremendous theoretical discussion where in we are dealing with the twin concepts of Jihaad and Islaam. Jihaad was born out of Islam. But is what the normal man today knows as terrorism justified to be included in the Jihaad framework? It is a question that Vishwaroopam asks too and almost dispassionately leaves the answer to the viewer - As dispassionate as Wiz/Wisam/Taufeeq - the Hero.
If the Muslims of Vishwaroopam are the ignorant and self proclaimed Jihaadis, the Hindu's are no less. In the tam-brahm heroine, Kamal has found a "back-door" entry into ridiculing the birdbrained practice called Brahminism (from a rationalists point of view, a lot of it is really really dumb) and he pulls it off quite well after his first attempt with Asin in Dashavatharam.
In making both the hero and the villain (played with a great punch by Rahul Bose in an extremely well written negative role - which is always the case with Kamal films) of the same faith, Vishwaroopam also draws upon a theme that Heyram had stressed more on - Muslims are an inseparable and undeniable part of Indian life. The Muslim will be your tailor, your best friend, he will rape and kill your wife, he will also save your life. In Vishwaroopam, its a simpler paradigm - He is the hero and he is the villain (a line Kamal himself says to Pooja Kumar in the movie)
That ways, to answer your question, Vishwaroopam is the hero and Vishwaroopam is the villain!!
PS: Any discussion on a Kamal movie that doesn't talk about Kamal - the actor does disservice to that movie. This performer has consistently managed to outdo himself every time he has been cast on screen. It is a quality very few have. In Vishwaroopam, the "method" is almost obvious. The last time I felt i could literally see a method actor in Kamal was way back in Aalavandhaan. It grew subtler with Heyram, Anbe Sivam and Virumandi but with Vishwanath (Wiz), this seems to have returned. It as usual is a complete pleasure to watch this veteran perform.
3 comments:
Lets talk some cinema nu sollitu verum trailer mattum paatha madhiri irukku thambi. Expected more "content". Good start, but I wish you make this private and expand the piece
Dai talking cinema doesn't mean naming all departmen and commenting on how each person has done :P . Cinema is primarily to be discussed in the sense of what's being said or meant or attempted. As far as "content" is concerned, the film too didn't have lots
an intelligent movie is the one that makes you think beyond what is told .. not necessarily one that has "an intelligent story telling". because most of the stories in real life are amazingly simple but whats complex is beyond what meets the eye. am not expecting every tees to be crossed, i-s dotted. the element of open-ended is what is extremely intelligent. they don't have to pander/square up with the audience, just provoke the thought process.
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