Dasavatharam - Review

First, what Kamal is trying to convey in this film?

Dasavatharam talks about the chaos theory (a.k.a Butterfly effect - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect). This was mentioned by Kamal in one of his interview prior to movie release.

The movie does Show "A Butterfly" (in graphics) flying across the screen at the beginning of the film in 12th Century and after the Tsunami Attack near the idol, clearly indicating that the Tsunami is an Outcome of "The Butterfly effect".



The Tsunami can be thought of as the butterfly effect of the idol that was drowned in the 12th century, that resulted in a miracle by saving thousands of lives in 21st century (simply, that idol thrown into sea in 12th century is the cause for tsunami). Also implies that it made Govind and Andal reunite in front of the same idol where they were separated 800 years ago!!

In film opening scene, camera travels over the Ocean into the Chennai top view and in 12th century after drowning Lord Vishnu with Kamal, the same camera angle moves from ocean into city.

Except the villan(Fletcher) and George Bush, mostly all other characters have Perumal names (Nambi, AVATAR Singh, Govind, PoovaRAGHAVAN, BalRAM naidu etc) and to say, Asin name is Andal.. Shiva, Shiva!!



Pluses:
1. Excellent climax fight scene between Fletcher and Tokyo master.
2. Dialogue:-
*) Bush to Tokyo master: Do you remember Hirosimha?
Tokyo Master to Bush: Do you remember Pearl Harbor?
*) Ari Vom!
*) 'Chee' tam baram!
*) Appa Per "RAMASWAMY", avar oru naatiyae KALAIGNAR!!
*) Madathullae thappu nadakarathu illaiyae??

and more Minus points:
1. unlike MMKR, there is no need for kamal to do all the 10 characters. All characters are not related to one another.
2. Kamal is still not learning from his previous mistakes (like hey ram). This film characters spoke multiple languages (Japanese, English, Bush English(!), Nellai Tamil, Iyer Tamil, Afganishtan Tamil, Chinese Tamil). Unable to follow the dialogues, even when some of the characters are speaking in English..
3. Tsunami is not a wave as shown in the film. It travels underwater and strike and burst only when it hits a landscape area. Tsunami graphic scenes are very very average.
4. Songs are very poor, except kallai mattum kandal and mukundha.
5. Copied the ideas from many films (passion of christ - 12th century Nambi - Comedy is after hooking iron chains thru Kamal skin, I cannot see a drop of blood coming out of his body) and (Da Vinci Code - throwing out the Idol and trying to save Asin).
6. Make-up: Pathetic - A very simple Balram Naidu makeup is really excellent when compared with complex Bush, Muslim khan, or Fletcher appearances)..



Kamal as a writer won it as a excellent story/screenplay and dialogue writer, but clearly failed to understand how to present it as 3 hour movie. Everyone will readily agree that, Kamal is a great actor and will do lot of hardwork/homework for each of his films.

But what Kamal needs to understand is, He should start acting in movies which people will like to Watch(like Rajini) rather that just act in movies which he likes and expect people to watch it.