Adipurush: When a Sacred Epic Gets Buried Under Bad VFX

In India, the Ramayana isn’t just a tale. It’s part of everyday life and culture, passed down through poems, songs, and iconic TV retellings. So when Om Raut announced Adipurush, a big-screen take on this Itihasa, expectations shot up fast. With a huge budget and major stars, it was meant to bring the Treta Yuga alive with modern filmmaking tools. What landed in theaters, though, feels more like a messy CGI experiment, closer to an old video game than a grand mythological epic.

Cast and Crew

• Director: Om Raut
• Lead Cast: Prabhas (Raghav), Kriti Sanon (Janaki), Saif Ali Khan (Lankesh), Sunny Singh (Shesh), Devdatta Nage (Bajrang)
• Music: Ajay-Atul, Sachet-Parampara
• Dialogues: Manoj Muntashir

A Familiar Story, Missing Its Spirit

Adipurush sticks to the broad path of the Aranya Kand and Yuddha Kand. Raghav (Prabhas) lives in exile with Janaki (Kriti Sanon) and his brother Shesh (Sunny Singh). Then Lankesh (Saif Ali Khan) kidnaps Janaki, and the story moves toward building an army, crossing the sea, and facing the ruler of Lanka.

The plot can’t fail on its own. It’s one of the most loved stories ever told. The issue is how the film presents it. The emotion, devotion, and warmth that people connect with get drained out. The visuals sit in a dull mix of black and gray, and the mood stays heavy for most of the runtime. The result feels cold, even during moments that should feel uplifting.

VFX Problems Take Over the Film

The biggest promise of Adipurush was its VFX and motion-capture work. Sadly, that’s also its weakest part. The Vanar Sena often looks unfinished, like soft, unclear digital shapes. Characters move in a way that doesn’t feel grounded, like they’re floating through scenes instead of standing in real spaces.

Lanka also disappoints. Instead of a rich, majestic city, it’s shown as a dark industrial fortress with a look that feels borrowed from Western fantasy films. The bats, the monster designs, and the set pieces lean into familiar outsider imagery, while the film ignores the bright and detailed visual language found in Indian mythology and traditional art.

Acting That Gets Lost Behind the Green Screen

Prabhas has the build for a warrior prince, but the performance feels distant. Raghav needs calm strength and inner light, but the character rarely shows it here. The heavy face touch-ups also hurt, because subtle expressions don’t land the way they should.

Kriti Sanon does well with what she’s given. She carries Janaki with grace and quiet dignity. Still, the writing limits her to long stretches of waiting, with little room to show depth beyond the basics.

Saif Ali Khan looks like he’s enjoying himself the most, but his Lankesh feels like he belongs in another film. The styling choices push him toward a cartoon vibe rather than the frightening and layered king many people expected. The ten-head effect also looks rough in places, and some shots feel more like a filter than a finished visual.

Dialogue and Music

Manoj Muntashir’s dialogues became controversial, and it’s easy to see why. The film uses modern slang to sound current, but it clashes hard with the setting. Hearing divine and royal characters talk like they’re in a present-day street fight breaks the mood right away.

The music is one of the few areas that works. Ajay-Atul’s “Jai Shri Ram” brings power and scale, and it’s one of the rare moments that feels emotionally right. The soundtrack often does more for the film than the visuals do, which says a lot.

Modern Style, Lost Identity

Retelling classic stories for new viewers is fine. The problem is when the update wipes out what made the story meaningful. Adipurush chases a superhero-style look so hard that it forgets its roots. The Ramayana remains timeless because of its values, dharma, sacrifice, devotion, and duty. Here, those themes get pushed aside for long action scenes and loud effects.

Many fights drag on without real tension. The final battle should feel big and moving, but it turns into a repetitive run through a fake-looking battlefield. The geography is unclear, the action lacks rhythm, and the stakes feel low because the characters don’t feel real enough.

Verdict

Adipurush ends up as a major letdown. It proves that a huge budget and a famous story can’t save a film when the creative choices don’t work. It doesn’t have the heart people remember from Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayan, and it also doesn’t meet the visual standard expected from modern big-screen cinema. Instead of honoring the epic, it feels like a hollow CGI-heavy attempt that never comes together.

If you want a moving retelling or a strong mythological film experience, this one won’t deliver. A better option is revisiting the 1992 Japanese-Indian animated film The Legend of Prince Rama. It’s decades old, but it tells the story with far more feeling and clearer visuals than this 2023 release.

iBomma Rating: 1.5 / 5 Stars

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