Most producers spend the week before a world premiere hoping the film lands. Namit Malhotra is already thinking about the toy aisle.
With Ramayana Part 1 set to premiere at the Academy Museum in Los Angeles on October 27, the producer has given his most detailed account yet of the project’s ambitions, The Indian Express reports. In short, he sees the two-part film as the opening chapter of a cinematic universe that he believes outranks Hollywood’s biggest franchises.
Not a movie, a launchpad
Speaking at the film’s Telugu pre-release event on Monday, Malhotra described the Ramayana less as a story to adapt and more as a philosophy passed down through generations of Indian families. He said the goal was never to make one or two films and call it a day. The films are meant to start Rama’s journey, not finish it.
To make the point, he played a previously unseen behind-the-scenes video setting out the full expansion plan. The list is long:
Video games
A merchandise line covering apparel, toys, gadgets and home furnishings
Spin-offs, including origin films, TV series and animated features
Theme park attractions
A Broadway musical
Virtual reality, augmented reality and metaverse experiences
Galaxy far, far away? Been there.
Malhotra didn’t avoid the obvious comparison. Star Wars, Marvel and DC each built what they call a universe, he said, and then made his claim: “Ramayana is a universe.”
He said a large part of the production went into explaining the epic’s scale to Western collaborators. His message to them, as he described it, was “this is bigger than anything you have.” He was quick to add that he and his team are fans of those franchises. The Ramayana simply came first, by a few thousand years.
No borrowed blueprints
Malhotra also addressed a long-running criticism of Indian mythological cinema: that it borrows Hollywood’s look and storytelling instead of developing its own. His answer was that the source material already has its own art, costumes, characters, creatures and music, so there’s no need to look elsewhere for inspiration. He described the project as an investment in what the next generation will inherit.
The roll call
The film’s credits are as large as its plans. Nitesh Tiwari, the National Award-winning director of Dangal and Chhichhore, directs. Ranbir Kapoor plays Rama and Yash plays Ravana. Yash also co-produces through his banner, Monster Mind Creations. Sai Pallavi is Sita, Sunny Deol is Hanuman and Ravie Dubey is Lakshman. Kajal Aggarwal plays Mandodari. Arun Govil, who played Rama in Ramanand Sagar’s 1987 TV series Ramayan, returns to the epic as King Dashrath.
Hans Zimmer and AR Rahman compose the score together. Shridhar Raghavan and Tiwari adapted the screenplay from Valmiki’s original text.
Ramayana Part 1 releases worldwide on November 5. Part 2 follows on Diwali 2027. The theme park, presumably, will take a bit longer.