Dasavadharam
A remarkable James Bond film with a touch of David Copperfield.
The basic reason why someone would make a movie is when he has a compelling story to say. Here the primary reason why this movie was made is because the guy had to be there in every single shot. He had a producer who could spend like Tsunami and a top notch technical crew to back him and so this movie.
I mean I can see the hero’s effort and suffering and all that in doing ten roles. But tell me the frickin reason why he had to do ten roles? And why not the parts essayed by Santhana Bharathi or P Vasu or for that matter, Asin?
Probably he had solved this like he would an operation research problem. Minimizing for the constraint of presence in every shot for the given screenplay would’ve given him an answer of at least ten roles. And so he did ten roles. The rule of thumb is like this: If you cannot recognize some face in the movie, you know who it is!
Somewhere in the title, some one gets credit for story.That was meant to be a joke. Don’t get fooled by that. If you know Mahavishnu the saviour and Tsunami you have the story.
The screenplay moves at break neck speed leaving you with no time to think. And thats the biggest plus point of the film. Thats why after all the fuss and blog posts like this, the movie is very watchable.
But alas a fast screenplay does not a great movie make. And this movie could’ve easily been a great movie if only he had cut at least five characters, given the characters some more depth, attemped a reason as to why those had to be done by the same person and made the screenplay a bit more realistic.
I could sense dialogues right at the end - “Naan kadavul illai nu sollave illai.. Kadavul Irundhirundha innum nalla irukume nu sonnen…” But some other dialogues are more statements from the actor the person than dialogues from characters.
Among the characters, Balram Naidu and Rangaraja Nambi stand out. I could feel bhakti and defiance when Hariharan renders “Om Namo Narayananaaaya” in the background. The humor in Balram Naidu makes him likeable.
The expressions when Vincent Bhuvaraghavan and Rangaraja Nambi drown is just top class. The details to body language and dialogue delivery are all spot on. He is not what he is without those. But we know about those ever since the days of Velu Nayakkar some twenty years back. I don’t want to praise a movie because the actor had great attention to details or can endure six hours of make-up. It should cascade down from the characters which in turn should derive from the story. Without those it looks the idea is not very different from the way K Bhagyaraj took stills like Vakeel, Doctor and graduate in ‘Rasukutti’.
Nevertheless its a remarkable movie from a technical standpoint. The first and last thirty minutes of the movie HAD to be watched in wide screen. Forget Tubetamil. Three or more characters performed by the same actor in a single scene never looked this natural in my knowledge. This is a landmark film in that sense.
Kudos to the entire technical crew for bringing to life a movie like this. And if at all this movie fails, very unlikely given the way the audience watched open-mouthed the rolling credits with the actors’ make-up et al, you know whom to blame.
And oh yeah, its N times better than last year’s Shanker’s debacle of a movie or the more recent Indiana Jones. Its another matter that comparing with films like that is a deserving insult.
June 14th, 2008 at 2:13 pm
I completely agree that there was no need for the 10 characters. But the 10 characters were the USP as well as the title of this wonderful film. The screenplay must have been super hard to conceive and that itself is an achievement of sorts. I wonder what expectations everyone had? Maybe they wanted to see all the 10 avtars of vishnu in this movie. This movie was about the “chaos theory” or the butterfly effect. The screenplay had to be chaotic and erratic for this to work and finally all the chaos had to culminate in a “tsunami” of events. Wonderful movie and you have written a decent review. But I sincerely feel that there is more than just the superficial makeup and the conundrum the movie showcases.
June 14th, 2008 at 9:56 pm
>>Without those it looks the idea is not very different from the way K >>Bhagyaraj took stills like Vakeel, Doctor and graduate in ‘Rasukutti’.
Sujan & I enjoyed this line very much!
June 14th, 2008 at 10:26 pm
subha
aama.. thanks
June 14th, 2008 at 11:05 pm
robbie
This movie is definitely watchable…I was not bored.
Maybe people will watch again to unearth even more kamals in the movie..
But I don’t think this movie deserves to be described ‘wonderful’ for the reasons mentioned in my post…
10 roles la padam muzhukka irukaradhinaale idhu kamal padam nu ennale solla mudila.. adhukaaga illai num solla mudilla..thats my dilemma
Be it chaos theory or relativity theory i expect good, emotional or moving or hilarious cinema from kamal…The key is not the theory. the key is good cinema from kamal…
This was running cinema with lots of magic..
Velai thedi pora payyan enga industry la portfolio nu onnu pannuvaan…
avan thiramayellam kaamichirupaan adhile… Kamal innum thannai velai thedi pora payyan madhiri nenaikiraar nu perumai padaradha.. illai innum apdiye irukaare nu varutha padaradha therilai…
June 15th, 2008 at 1:11 am
Kamal innum thannai velai thedi pora payyan madhiri nenaikiraar - Egjactly. Very well put. This is the first honest review, I have read. I have a ticket for watching it a 2nd time, I might go again to understand if I have missed something. But from whatever I observed even a very educated crowd seems very confused from the comments that I overheard.
My first impression - Dasavatharam = self-indulgence gone overboard. Not the final impression though. But again, if one has to watch a movie multiple times to understand it, what does it mean ? Watching Anbe MMKR or Anbe Sivam multiple times is for a different reason. Ennamo Ponga …
June 15th, 2008 at 2:13 am
BNB
Thanks
Edhukum poradhuku munnaadi Discovery channel la indha chaos theory butterfly effect etc etc pathi edhuna video parthutu ponga..
Kamal would’ve embedded some more matter which might not be discernible on first viewing.
>>Ennamo Ponga..
exactly
June 15th, 2008 at 3:24 am
pk..
matha review ellamum padichen.. seriously.. ungaldhula plus and minus solli irukeenga!!
well, enaku rasukutti nyabagam illa :)- i can imagine what u r trying to say!!
June 16th, 2008 at 8:08 am
priya
nandri hai
June 16th, 2008 at 12:53 pm
hey,
aren’t you the one that recently won the academy awards? oh yeah!!…now then, u have every right to write whatever crap u want
June 16th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
PK
Nice review, I will watch it when it comes in DVD.
No more tamil movies for some time. Buggers here charge $20/ticket and host it in some lousy/cheesy theater. So will watch it in my home theater.
So potta kasa edhuthuduvangala
June 16th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
[…] Dasavatharam – by Prabhu Karthik […]
June 16th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
ganesh
Brindha theatre la makkal laam padam super ku sollitu ponaanga!
i hope they do for the sake of aascar
June 17th, 2008 at 12:45 pm
We just watched the movie this weekend and I second your opinion that there was ‘too much’ of Kamal. I also agree with you that perhaps if Kamal had reduced the number of roles he chose to play, it would be a far more powerful movie.
On the flip side, I felt that the movie was quite interesting (compared to the crap that I have seen in recent times) and should be appreciated for trying to do something different. How often we complain about movies that are a complete waste of time. I see this as an experiment, that quite did not get it right completely, but this kind of screenplay / presentation is quite new to tamil world of cinema, so I would give kudos for the attempt.
There were some roles that could not have been done so well by someone else (and I am NOT a Kamal fan!!!).The paati character was very real and very believable (we have had some Motta-Paatti’s in our families) so I know. Balram Naidu was hilarious on screen but very realistic.
You don’t need special effects and masala in all movies, but you do need them from time to time. Even our older movies (e.g. Maya Bazaar) had special effects. Vittlachariyar movies are fun to watch even today. If all movies were made in the real world, the magic of cinema would be lost..fantasy / special effects / masala / realism are all essential to make cinema interesting. Otherwise it would be become monotonous and boring.
Time and Costs are big constraints in movies such as this one where there is great reliance on special effects makeup. Studios in Hollywood have limitless amount of funds and resources, so the movies are often visually spectacular. The same cannot be said about Indian movies. We have made great strides in recent times though.
Dasavatharam was in no way perfect. There is a long list of great english movies in that relied entirely on fantastic screen play and not much on story. We don’t have that many as yet in Indian cinema and still have a lot to learn.
Dasavatharam was a step in the right direction (it tried to do something different and new).
June 17th, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Have to watch it for myself! Nice review though..
June 18th, 2008 at 1:53 am
I would say just go with neutral mind, you would enjoy and find it entertaining. I watched 2 times and I did see the effort and hard work that might have gone into making this file. Remember - You are watching a tamil film. I personally feel this movie is far better than the much hyped Sivaji with off beaten story. For the hard work and true efforts, I would say Kamal deserves atleast a pat as an encouragement so he can try to make even better movies and take tamil cinema to the next level. He does deserves Kudos for what is doing. Don’t you agree?
June 18th, 2008 at 2:11 am
ganesh
This was definitely watchable.. I think I’ve made that clear in my post as well.
I agree with you on kamal’s performance (ever since the day of 16 vayadhinile).. i just do not want to praise this movie for that..
>>Dasavatharam was a step in the right direction
He can go several steps in the right direction except that he did not IMHO.
As much as I don’t want to condemn him, I don’t want to praise him for stopping well short…
June 18th, 2008 at 2:12 am
vinesh
Definitely not bad.. and trust me we have watched worse movies..
Its not a great kamal movie when it could have been easily..
parthutu sollu
June 18th, 2008 at 2:15 am
Anand
I believe i did see the film with neutral mind. And i am a kamal admirer (not quite a fanatic though)
>I personally feel this movie is far better than the much hyped Sivaji
Absolutely..I think i’d mentioned that as well (shanker’s debacle of a movie).
An amateur guy like me kurai solra alavukku sila matter iruku nu dhaan varutham
June 18th, 2008 at 3:40 pm
Dei.. of all the people (we were 22 in number) who went to the movie that night, I came to know that I was the only one who liked the movie.
Everyone thought I’m going crazy — they told me that I’m watching too many crappy movies from Netflix.
June 18th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Nice review Pk. i neccesarily do not agree with the fact that it had a good screenplay… to me the script was good, screenplay spoilt it.. Opinions Differ right.. Definetly not Kamal’s (Iam a Big Kamal Fan as a Creator) Best , But i would not evn compare this with Sivaji ( Iam a big Rajni Fan, of course
, jus coz, That was a PAthetic Movie, except for the last 15 mins. Dasa is just not 100 % Kamal’ism (It is still there in him 
.. ..I guess this way he is trying to balance between him being a Producer’s actor as well as a Creator of good, meaningful Cinema.. I Think, it is safe not to expect a Mahanadhi, Anbeshivam, Virumaandi or MMKR from him… Pls stop by www.charmingemini.wordpress.com ( i have two posts on dasa)
June 18th, 2008 at 9:14 pm
Gopi
I think the movie is a hit in India. Most of the neutral folks i spoke to, thought they kinda liked the movie. If reports from Kerala and Andhra are any indication, its a bigger hit over there…
June 18th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
TK
I agree with you for the most part. Thanks for the URL. Apees la vettiya irukkumbodhu kandippa varen
June 30th, 2008 at 2:15 am
This movie seems to have got the Hollywood interested for the wrong reasons! One being the trademark violation by Oscar Films Pvt. Ltd and their logo resembling the Oscar statuette in every detail!!
this way i guess Kamal acting skills will get noticed
I haven’t seen the movie yet, but from what i have heard about the make up of certain characters being pathetic at times. I guess in those terms Eddie Murphy is a far more superior when it comes to darning different roles with ease.
July 10th, 2008 at 7:19 am
I do not see any reason to discuss why 10 roles for Kamal. Why did Great Nadigar Thilagam play 9 roles in Navarathiri? Even that could have been played by 9 different people, isn’t it? But they had to package that movie as Nadigar Thilagam movie so was Sivaji the Great in 9 roles. Its same here. I agree more with Robbie in this that 10 roles is the USP, whether it is ego trip for Kamal or not.
Regards
R Sathyamurthy
July 10th, 2008 at 10:04 am
sathyamurthy
welcome here. honestly i expected more reasons from kamal for those 10 avatars.
i agree how it was in navarathiri. i expected kamal to not just exceed shivaji by one character but also kamal as a script writer.