An experimental actor, after a series of failures across Tamil, Malayalam and Telugu industries, shot to fame with his breakthrough role of a college student having a brain injury in the 1999 romantic drama film Sethu. His intense performance in the film won him the Filmfare Special Jury Award. Whether masala entertainment movies or serious concept-based films, Vikram is one of the few actors in Kollywood, who has proved his acting abilities with exemplary performances. Of the several films he has starred in, his most prominent ones include Dhill (2001), Gemini (2002), Dhool (2003), Samy (2003), Pithamagan (2003), Anniyan (2005), Kanthaswamy (2009), Raavanan (2010), Deiva Thirumagal (2011), I (2015) and Iru Mugan (2016).