50 years to the legend Kamal!

Today (Aug 12th), Kamal completes 50 years of on-screen acting. Below was my take on Dasavatharam movie when it released in 2008. To a person who has been a trend setter always, here's my salute:

Off late, Kamal is always racing against himself. None seem to be up there racing with him. When a man has seen so much in his field, I wonder how is thought process will be. Will he be thinking cinema even in his dreams? Maybe. But as my better half quipped "When he can 'act' in ten different ways, why does he don ten different make ups?". I had no answer to that question. But this question very well could be the answer to how Dasavatharam fares (how is when you watch the movie). Not that the man himself would worry about. The box office hype and marketing strategies (something he missed out for Aalavandhan) will certainly carry the film across.

But as a fan, what do I get?

Kamal in all his brilliance. Period.

The body language and dialogue delivery of all the ten roles will blow you out. The tremendous effort put in for each role are evidently seen and will be appreciated. There is subtle humour around every corner and the constant poking of Kamal's atheist-in-him is beautifully done (aka Anbe Sivam's character). The graphics are good. Background score is done well.

Maybe they did this film in a hurry but some of the make ups could have been done better. They seem way out of place and artificial. The story is loosely based on Chaos theory and is woven beautifully to accomodate the Tsunami in a way we would not have imagined. But some of the characters that Kamal plays seem thrusted upon the story. Its almost like 'heyyy...i am done with 8 characters.....now, where do i fit the 9th one...'.

All said and done, its worth a watch once to see the greatest actor of our times to put himself in unfamiliar grounds once more and come out with his glory intact (albeit with a few scars).