Dasavatharam got opened up further today, with a new still and Kamal’s interview in The Hindu. Here are some highlights:

“Dasavatharam has a lot of Al Gore in it, and also Ramanujar,” he says.

“For one, there are 10 characters, ranging in scope from a Ramanujar and a Galileo to a particle physicist. Computer graphics bring to life many of the scenes.”

“Amitabh Bachchan will also be here,” adds Kamal. “Chan is well known to the producer. So he decided to invite him. It will be a grand event,” he says with a smile.

“I enjoy telling stories so it was a wonderful experience. And it’s been a great team, together with an understanding producer (Oscar Ravichandran) and a competent director (K.S. Ravikumar) at the helm. It’s not as though there were no egos but the project sailed smoothly thanks to frank and creative exchanges,” Kamal adds.

“It’s rare for a composer from the north to create tunes that allow the lyricist here to lend words with equal ease. Himesh has pulled that off. You will find in Himesh’s song, the joy of an M.S.Viswanathan tune. Those in the unit were initially sceptical but they fell for his music,” says Kamal.

No conversation with Kamal is complete without a reference to his mentor Ananthu. “He would always say, ‘keep it simple.’ I’ve followed that,” says the veteran. The humour and fun of ‘Michael Madana Kamarajan,’ the sadness of ‘Mahanadhi,’ the sentimentality of ‘Thevar Magan’ and the emotions of ‘Hey!Ram!’ are all woven into a screenplay that is irreverent enough to defy pundit-driven formulas. Yet, ‘Dasavatharam’ will remain faithful to time-tested storytelling techniques, he says.

[With inputs from Ananth]

[Picture courtesy: BehindWoods]

With the release of this new still and the audio release pretty much confirmed for April 25, the Dasavatharam blitzkrieg seems to have begun. We have a new interview with KS Ravikumar in the Madras Plus section of Economic Times:

• He attributes the delay to the need for compressing huge amount of material to around 3 hours, including about two and half hours with computer graphics.
• He says that he has never before worked so hard on a movie.
• He clarifies that politicians have not really ‘acted’ in the movie, but that clippings featuring them have been used.
• He confirms that there are no duet songs between Asin and Kamal.

Various reports in MSN, Thatstamil, Galatta.com, Behindwoods and IndiaGlitz talk about the grand audio release function featuring a set resembling the Oscar awards ceremony. Surpassing all earlier estimates, it is also said that the number of prints that will get released may touch 1500!

The storm is arriving shortly at the coast.

[With inputs from Ananth]

Two new stills of Dasavatharam are out today! Actually, they are two versions of the same pose. The first one, of course, has special effects. With this, the Sikh character is also confirmed.

Expecting a steady stream of stills to come out from here on.

[With input from Ananth]

[Picture courtesy: BehindWoods]

Yes, something was brewing at the Dasavatharam camp atleast. The first full set of stills and some news was released today.

Not surprisingly, none of the ‘get-ups’ have been revealed. This set of stills just serves as a teaser, marking the start of the publicity in the run-up to the movie’s release.

The stills feature Kamal, Asin and Mallika predominantly. Some of them match with a few released earlier on Mallika’s Web-site.

Some of the rumours that surfaced earlier are now confirmed with the release of these stills.

Other details that have come up:

• Two more songs are to be picturised. They will cost about 3 crore (30 million) Rupees and sets for the same are being worked upon currently.
• The audio will be released in October.
• A fight sequence with Kamal pitted against Kamal himself was shot for 20 days, employing a Hollywood stunt director. Another chase sequence was filmed in Chidambaram.
• While Asin dubs for herself for the first time, Kamal is supposed to have used a different voice for each character he plays. Meanwhile, 5000 people have dubbed for a scene involving around 10000 people!
• English and Japanese linguists have been used for the movie.
• Several directors have acted in the movie.

Today’s news seems to indicate that a Diwali release isn’t likely. We are probably looking at December.

Read detailed reports and enjoy more stills on The Hindu, Sify.com, Behindwoods and IndiaGlitz.

[Picture courtesy: BehindWoods]

KollywoodToday.com has published a new set of Dasavatharam stills. Check out Kamal in a Sikh get-up. Notice anything strange? I can see a prosthetic nose for a start.

More updates later…..

The first stills of Dasavatharam are out in the latest issue of Kunkumam. The stills reveal 2-3 get-ups of Kamal and not surprisingly, people’s predictions seem to have gone wrong.

TamilShots features a nice little photo album of Kamal. It contains stills and some rare photos like Kamal receiving doctorate, at his home (?) and with Gowthami. Check it out...

While Vaettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu continues to burn the box-office charts and also the comments section on this blog, we have some more updates related to the movie.

The United States Consul General in Chennai, David Hopper watched the movie in a private screening, reports The Hindu.

Unlike Hollywood films, Indian films were a mix of music, drama, action … I thoroughly enjoyed watching the film,” Mr. Hopper said.

Meanwhile, Gautham opened up in an inter-college cultural festival. Excerpts:

In justification of all the gore and violence in his latest movie, `Vettaiyadu Vilayadu’, the director said that the film was meant to disturb the people.

He claimed that `Vettaiyadu Vilayadu’ was among the first films in recent times to have unparalleled technical finesse.

…the director had ended up hero-worshipping Kamal Hassan in `Vettaiyadu Vilayadu’. “I guess the fan of Kamal in me could not be suppressed,” responded the director.

We have been awaiting Vaettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu for a long while now. Though various pieces of news and rumours keep appearing, there has been a hesitation to publish any of those as posts. Finally, at a stage when we have almost been numbed, this round of news seems to be really true. Today, I even saw ads in newspapers!

VV is releasing on August 25 (this Friday). Get more details here and there. Check out the official Web-site too.

This makes it double-sweet for Kamal fans, with Dasavatharam having been launched just a few days ago. You can see fans eagerly predicting which theatres in Chennai will screen it.

Poster courtesy: http://www.vettaiyaaduvilaiyaadu.com

Dasavatharam started rolling yesterday as announced earlier. Obviously, posters were out in Chennai city and so were ads in newspapers. Thanks to soonapaana.blogspot.com, we get to see them here (including the Hindi version).

Good to see curiousity being aroused. But one is also reminded of the hype and build-up of Aalavandhaan.

Meanwhile, the news is that the funding for Dasavatharam is done upto 50% by Pyramid Saimira. If I remember right, this group is also involved in setting up digital theatres across the country. If they also take care of releasing the movie, it might just be the kind of digital distribution that Kamal has talked about many times over.