“This is Vibhishan from Adipurush. After getting Ravan killed, he will head on to Cyber hub Gurgaon where he works at a social media agency”, reads the caption accompanying a still from Adipurush which shows actor Siddhant Karnick sporting a buzzcut and a well-groomed beard. He looks like he walked out of GQ magazine cover in a film that is supposedly set in the Satyug. But that is the least of Adipurush’s concerns.
The gross misinterpretation of Ramayana, questionable VFX and reserved seats for Hindu deities to appeal to the right-wing are far worse. Ironically, with Hindu Sena moving to the High Court and demanding a ban on the film’s screenings, director Om Raut has failed to garner appreciation of the very audience he was pandering to. But this is not meant to be an analysis of the film on its merits (or the lack thereof).
Adipurush disappears from Tribeca line-up
Adipurush’s opening weekend and the events that unfolded on Twitter (and in theatres) were more entertaining than the film. Rarely does one get to see such a tumultuous opening weekend. For starters, Adipurush disappeared rather mysteriously from the line-up of Tribeca Film Festival a few days before its June 16 release. The sudden disappearance rightfully drew ire of Indie filmmakers who fought against the odds to have their film showcased at the film festival but Om Raut’s Adipurush made its way to Tribeca without much hassle. That was until it disappeared from the festival’s website. This raised eyebrows but makes sense in hindsight — reviews from Tribeca, a film festival covered by international critics, could have adversely affected the film’s performance on Indian box office. But this was just the start for what was about to come.
A disaster of epic proportions
The early morning shows of Adipurush had Prabhas fans staying up all night to watch the Bahubali actor in the film. The same fans set a theatre in Telangana's Sangareddy on fire following a 40-minute delay in screening. Towards the end of the day, videos of Prabhas fans surfaced where they looked defeated. They didn’t have a defence for what unfolded on the celluloid. What really transpired in between these hours?
After the early morning shows on Friday, June 16, concluded, Twitter was flooded with images which showed Adipurush’s state-of-the-art VFX and its actors — Saif Ali Khan as Lankesh in a 5x2 configuration of heads, Prabhas as Raghava wearing leather sandals, and Kriti Sanon as Janaki wearing an outfit which upset Hindu sentiments.
leather and shoes !! How and why?#BoycottAdipurush #OmRautMaafiMango#Adipurush #BlockbusterAdipurush #OmRaut #manojmuntashir #Prabhas #SaifAliKhan pic.twitter.com/IKqhGTKqVu— बजरंगBhakt (@Bajrang_Bhkt) June 16, 2023
Around 11 am, videos from the screening surfaced showing the Hindu deities' mouth dialogues like “Teri bua ka bagecha hai kya jo hawa khane chala aaya" (Is it your aunt’s garden that you’ve come to take a stroll)? and “Kapda tere baap ka… tel tere baap ka… Aag tere baap ki…Toh jalegi bhi tere baap ki." (The cloth belongs to your father, so do the oil and cloth, so your father butt will burn). The last line was said by Hindu god Hanuman. In another scene, a mythological character says, “Jo humari behno ko haath lagaayenge, unki Lanka laga denge.” Naturally, these dialogues upset Hindus.
Legal trouble and toxic fandom
Around 4 pm, a video which showed Prabhas fans beating up a man who called Adipurush a ‘bad film’ surfaced. The man said “In Baahubali, he was like a king and there was royalty. Seeing the royalty in that, they took him for this role. Om Raut did not show Prabhas properly.” Before he could finish, the crowd pounced on him. Meanwhile, Twitter exploded with divisive reviews. While some defended Om Raut, others were furious after watching the film. In no time, dialogue writer Manoj Muntashir was top trend of Twitter for obvious reasons.
#Adipurush - #Prabhas fans beating the public for giving genuine review
Worst behavior #AdipurushTickets #AdipurushOnJune16pic.twitter.com/zV8waEWm4z— VCD (@VCDtweets) June 16, 2023
That is when things got serious — around 6 pm on June 16 when the evening shows began, Hindu Sena filed a writ petition in Delhi High Court against Adipurush makers for depicting the “religious leaders/ characters/ figures in an inaccurate and inappropriate manner”. They demanded a ban on screening the film.
Crackdown on negative reviews
Late in the night, T-Series began a crackdown on negative reviews on Twitter. Reviews that had images or videos from the screening were blocked on grounds of copyright. As of now, the tweets where Prabhas (who plays Ram/Raghava) is seen wearing leather shoes have disappeared from Twitter. Most show “media disabled on copyright grounds”. This surely warrants a question on just how sensitive filmmakers and directors are to criticism and how well-oiled PR machinery plays a key role in silencing critics who exercise their right to freedom of expression to critique a work of art (assuming Adipurush can be called ‘art’).
Given the #BoycottBollywood hashtag and hounding of film reviewers, film criticism is anyway breathing its last in India. Must filmmakers also silence honest critique of film on artistic grounds? Only so much PR can mitigate a disaster like Adipurush. Why resort to copyright striking, or worse, suspending Twitter accounts giving genuine reviews of a film which has failed to impress even its target audience? Even the creators of Doordarshan’s (Ramanand Sagar’s) Ramayan are less than impressed with Om Raut’s cinema, calling the film’s dialogue ‘tapori’ and ‘chhapri’ (pedestrian).
For now, Adipurush’s opening weekend continues to unfold like a Nolan mystery. No one knows who Prabhas’s fans might attack or if the film will get banned, after all. But amid the meme fests, VFX trolling and roasting, it is film criticism that is dying at the altar of toxic fandom and PR battles.
Adipurush is now playing in theaters.