Vishwaroopam 2

Vishwa-loo

Vishwaroopam 2 left me very curious about two things. One, who is a nuclear oncologist? Is it a person who studies nuclear medicine? Or is it a person who can defuse nuclear bombs? Or is it a cancer doctor? And if she is so smart why does she act so ditzy? Two, why does everybody need to go to the loo so much?

These are simple questions that occupied my mind most of the time since the rest of the movie left me quite befuddled and bored. There are various terrorists from Al Qaeda scattered around the world and there is RAW which has various people such as Shekhar Kapoor and another boss who calls everyone ‘Collateral damage’ and a double agent and of course Wisam, the main guy. Then there is the ditzy nuclear oncologist(DNO) Nirupama who is Wisam’s wife and Ashmita who was Wisam’s trainee in the army and who had a crush on him from the kind of hate vibes she sends Nirupama.

The terrorists keep trying to blow up Wisam who keeps killing them in turn. The thing is that no one really dies. They get blown up, stabbed, burnt etc but after a few scenes, they are back to fight the good fight. I guess in the intervening period they all go to the loo to relieve themselves and wash their wounds. There is also Wisam’s mother with dementia thrown in for good measure.

There is a story somewhere but the constant switching between the present and the past leaves me dizzier than the DNO. There are some major action scenes underwater and some rather gory fights and stabbings but they just seem kind of episodic rather than taking the story forward. It’s like Wisam is needed everywhere to defuse every bomb ever set ticking. I don’t see the master plan or the end goal that would make all the hard work worthwhile.

To top it, just when things are heating up, we take a small break for a romantic scene between DNO and Wisam set strangely to a rather beautiful Krishna bhajan. Quick on its heels comes another song with the mother. And then the realisation that there is work to be done and we go back to the bombing etc. The background music is pretty good though.

I don’t know what to say about any of the acting. Kamal Haasan dominates every single frame of the movie. The two women Pooja Kumar as DNO and Andrea Jeremiah as Ashmita just irritate though Andrea at least has some fighting to do. Rahul Bose does some amazing thing where he rolls one eye up and keeps it there. Maybe it’s some prosthetic but it’s impressive. Along with a raspy voice and some awesome burn make-up he makes a good terrorist. Shekhar Kapur hangs around looking cool and then vanishes in the second half. Maybe he got bored. Waheeda Rehman looks wonderful and sweet and provides a brief respite from everything.

There are some good special effects in the movie and if you like fights and explosions and stabbings etc you may like this. It didn’t work for me at all. This weekend it has been 8 years since I started reviewing movies and stuff like this makes me wonder why I still do it. Guess that’s what an addiction is. Keep reading folks. It keeps me going.