Vishwaroopam is the story of Vishwanadh aka Taufique aka Kashmiri (Kamal Hassan) who is a Jihadi trainer in Afghanistan and he is on a mission. An issue arises between him and Jihadi leader Omar (Rahul Bose) who later decides to settle scores with Vishwanadh, who is leading his life as a normal dance school teacher. And that attempt reveals the other side of Vishwanadh and his past.
No actor in the world can easily earn the tag of Universal actor; Kamal Hassan had earned it and is living up to its name. He excelled in all the three roles in the movie. The role of Vishwanath evoked good humour and his performance is excellent in the role of terrorist. Pooja Kumar is too good and Andrea Jeremiah is just okay. Rahul Bose is superb as baddie. Jaideep is good as Omar's close aide. Rest of them are good in the little roles they are offered.
Vishwaroopam is Kamal Hassan's dream project. He proved himself as a director with this movie. In all the technical departments, he set a new standard to Indian cinema. The movie is almost on par with an Hollywood movie in terms of visual grandeur. But he had failed to deliver a racy screenplay which is extremely crucial for a thriller movie. The narration part goes way ward in the first half. And the screenplay is perfect in the second half.
Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy's music is good and enhanced the effect of the scenes. They seem to have inspired by the BGM of The Dark Knight in some places. Songs are absolutely show stoppers in the movie.
Sanu Varghese's cinematography in the movie is one of the best things that happened to Indian cinema in recent times. Every frame looked so real and audience gets a feel of Hollywood kind of movie when watching. Art work especially in the Afghan episodes looked excellent. Audience cannot differentiate between set work and reality.
Vishwaroopam is miles ahead of the other Indian movies in terms of technicality. The movie will be embraced by A class audience for sure, But on the flip side, enough care in the narration and addition of entertainment elements would have made it dearer to masses.