Coming as a prequel as well as a sequel to VISHWAROOP released in 2013, the latest Kamal Hassan venture continues from exactly the point where it left in the first part, but never turns out to be any gripping spy thriller, unexpectedly coming from a thinking actor-director.
The film surprisingly never succeeds in making any kind of connect with the viewers throughout its more than two hours of duration, though it desperately tries to do so with some deliberately added sequences related with an old ailing mother and a supporting wife. Following a non-linear and complex kind of narrative, the writer-director keeps stretching it beyond a point resulting in a tedious film. Plus a lot of conversations either remain less understandable or make no sense whatsoever confusing the eager audience.
Relying heavily on its combat scenes and stunts, VISHWAROOP 2 tries hard to appear as some kind of out of the box attempt with a strong message against world terrorism. But in the process forgets the ‘must have connect with the audience’ providing the wholesome entertainment they buy their ticket for.
The flashbacks are confusing and several cameos in the film make no impact of any kind including names such as Waheeda Rehman, Shekhar Kapur and Anant Mahadevan. In fact the whole segment of Anant trying to kill Kamal remains the silliest part of the script unarguably. In addition, both Rahul Bose & Jaideep Ahlawat as the evil terrorist (hamming at their best) look funny instead of scary representing an infamous terror group hugely affecting the film’s overall impact. Also, I really couldn’t understand Rajendra Gupta’s obsession with the term ‘Collateral Damage’. On the other hand, the girls Pooja Kumar and Andrea Jeremiah perform well bringing in the few likable lighter moments.
Stuffing too much into the narration in an attempt to make a powerful film, VISHWAROOP 2 actually becomes an unbearable mess despite its praise-worthy action, cinematography and dramatic background score. However, the soundtrack as usual remains one of its weakest features along with editing and surprisingly VFX too, especially in the scenes where the character are there in a moving vehicle. It’s really annoying why the croma shoots easily get caught in our films, whereas we don’t get any such feeling watching the foreign flicks.
Coming to Kamal Haasan, the lead actor, co-writer, producer and the director of the film, unfortunately he doesn’t look convincing enough playing the spy with the age clearly being the major damaging factor. Kamal, no doubt makes an earnest effort participating in the visibly difficult scenes including the emotional ones, but you frankly never feel excited or connected watching an entirely dull presentation.
In all, recalling the earlier film, VISHWAROOP 1 had a highly impressive first half and a comparatively terrible second ending on a poor note. VISHWAROOP 2 interestingly takes it forward from that exact poor note and never makes a comeback further sliding down to more unbearable levels. And I think that should say it all about this supposedly patriotic espionage action thriller.
Rating : 1.5 / 5