Friday 1 February 2013

Vishwaroopam

Its been a long time since I had been waiting for Vishwaroopan. Usually I don't review movies on my blogs, I just like to talk about the movies I like and which I want others to see but today is an exception. If you are looking for the allegations and controversies behind it then this is not the post to read because its strictly a movie review. But I would like to maintain the fact that there is nothing which I found to be offensive to any particular community.

Vishwaroopam - everyone in India now knows whose film it is, who is the actor, writer, director or producer. It  needs no introduction but still I would like to fill in the deatils. Vishwaroopam, is a Tamil film, whose Hindi version- Vishwaroop released in Mumbai today. It has been written, directed and produced by Kamal Haasan who is also the lead actor in it.

Given the exact nature of the story, its a spy-thriller, a genre which is somewhat unexplored in India. Although films like Ek Tha Tiger and Agent Vinod released last year, we never got to see any good concrete spy story. Vishwanath/Wiz (Kamal Haasan) is an Indian spy living in U.S.A. He is married to a much younger girl, Nirupama (Pooja Kumar) who is nuclear oncologist. Nirupama is unaware of the secret life of her husband and thinks that he is just a stupid Kathak teacher. She has married him just for the sake of a safe haven in U.S.A.

On the parallel, an Al-Qaeda Jihadi Omar (Rahul Bose) and his accomplice Salim (Jaideep Ahlawat) have planned to attack New York with a deadly nuclear weapon. Our hero Wiz has a past history with them from an earlier mission in Afghanistan.  With a series of events Wiz and Omar come across each other and the game starts.

The story has a lot to offer and two storylines go on together, the current feud between Wiz & Omar and the earlier mission of Wiz in Afghanistan when he is close and almost like a brother to Omar and Salim.

The performances by the actors are very good. Kamal Haasan proves his worth. Pooja Kumar and Andrea Jeremiah look beautiful and manage to stay on level. Shekhar Kapur with the little time he is seen on screen does a fantastic job. Rahul Bose and Jaideep Ahlawat too give out brilliant performances.

The film is worth a watch to everyone who is interested in good & entertaining cinema and a slap on the face of every person who thinks and criticizes Indian Cinema of not being on par with Hollywood. A good but somewhat incomplete story, a brilliant direction, great cinematography and lot of amazing action sequences.

I would have liked to go on with the end and the points left behind for the sequel. But it would spoil the experience of many who haven't watched it. Overall its a great film. Three and a half stars out a five, if you ask me. (If at all you ask me :P )