Actor of the week award goes to... Kamal Haasan

This is how a Kamal Haasan fanatic would narrate the story of ‘Dasavatharam‘to his kids: Kamal, the 12th century Vaishnavite, gets tied to his Vishnu idol, and is thrown into the Bay of Bengal. Back to Century 21. Kamal, the scientist, is working on a bio-weapon. Kamal, the terrorist, is after it. It lands up with Kamal, the ‘paatti’ (Tamil word for Grand Old Lady). The president of the United States, Kamal the George Bush, is worried. Kamal, the Japanese judo expert, pushes a few wannabes around. Kamal, the social worker, loiters with intent. Kamal, the erratic cop sleepwalks in absolute moronic bliss! Kamal, the Bhangra crooner, spits blood. Kamal, the tall guy, is all smiles. In the end, Kamal, the terrorist, catches up with Kamal, the scientist, and snatches the bio-weapon. Kamal, the Judo expert, lands in time to deliver a few ‘Matrix’ian kicks. “Remember Hiroshima”, the American terrorist tells him. “Remember Pearl Harbour” is the retort. Nothing meaningful comes out of the slugfest and Kamal, the cop, flies down in a copter, and fires at Kamal, the terrorist, who stubbornly chews the bio-weapon tab and ends up on the FX guy’s table. Meanwhile, the Bay of Bengal decides to throw in a Tsunami and it is a huge washout, by all means.

If you have managed to survive the above passage, you can definitely survive ‘Dasavatharam’. The verdict is out. Kamal has finally sealed the age-old debate on whether art is for the sake of society or vice versa: Art is for the sake of the actor. Society is for the sake of the actor as well!

The only regret Haasan might have after this venture would be his inability to play the characters other than the Perfect 10—the ones that were played by a few unlucky actors. Kamal, certainly, thinks ahead of His times, but technology is finding it hard to catch up with him and be a catalyst to his whims. Disappointing is not the word for ‘Dasavatharam’. It is bigger than that. The signature trait of Kamal Haasan’s screenwriting has been his ability to blend different ideas on the palette and serve it on the canvas with colourfully powerful strokes. In ‘Dasavatharam’, we don’t see that at all. It is a narcissistic misadventure that would make even the most fanatic of Kamal Haasan fans shrink in exasperation.

Thematically, this film is a rollercoaster ride minus the thrill! The writer has too much to tell the viewer; he just goes ahead and bombards the screen with a cluttered script. Naturally, one would have expected Kamal to do his homework well before attempting something of this magnitude. Given his track record, it would have been unjustified to think otherwise. But what we see here is an indifferent writer overstepping a stooge-of-a-director to deliver a mega-dud. ‘Dasavatharam’ was touted to be a feather on Kamal’s crown. Feather, it surely is, but not certainly plucked from the plumage of the King Bird.
From the actor’s point of view, ‘Dasavatharam’ is a marvel only when looked at from the Guinness Book vantage. It is prolific but not majestic. Of the 10 prosthetic goblins in the movie, only the character of the’ Andhraphile’ Cop catches the eyeball. Kamal has done a neat job of mimicking to perfection TS Balaiyya, the super yet forgotten actor from Tamil Cinema’s fifties-sixties. The other characters are victims of prosthetic excesses. It is not portrayals that we see here. It is only a kinesthetic rambling in self-love!

The three-hour ordeal comes to an end with the Kamal Haasan paean, danced out on screen by a sycophantic KS Ravi Kumar, the director of the film. ‘Dasavatharam’ might remind you of elaborately-staged school plays, but there is no denying the effort that has gone into this colossal wreck. It is a Titanic on celluloid. A great vessel on an ego trip, with not enough lifeboats on board.

You can hate ‘Dasavatharam’. But you can never ignore it.

The actor of the week? Of course, it is Kamal, for his tribute to the great TS Balaiyya, and the nine hours he spent on the make-up table every day during the shoot of this “Magnum Opus”.
But yes, Universal Hero! We will dance with You before we go! The privilege has always been ours. Admirers that we all are, we would happily revert to the Pre-‘Dasavatharam’ mode. And we have enough cud to chew!
Better luck, next time!