On October 2, when the teaser of Prabhas starrer Adipurush dropped on the internet, it achieved something unthinkable: An almost instant, lightning-fast speed trending on social media. But not for the right reasons. Within minutes, social media users tore apart the teaser of the mammoth film, calling out its gimmicky visual effects and shoddy character design.
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In the days that followed, the backlash against the upcoming mythological epic only intensified. It was no more about its questionable VFX but also the supposed hurting of religious sentiments of allegedly not portraying Valmiki’s Ramayana, on which it is based, respectfully. Adipurush features Prabhas as Lord Ram, Saif Ali Khan as Ravan and Kriti Sanon as Sita.
To take control of the situation and to turn the tide against the heavy ridicule, within days, the makers held a special 3D screening of its teaser in Mumbai, which was received better by the select media that viewed it–including the author–as it looked a far more immersive experience than in 2D. But the audience on the internet, which didn’t have the access to watch the one-minute-fifty second teaser in 3D, remained steadfast on their critical view of the film’s first video unit.
The film is still three months away from its scheduled release on January 12. Is there a way the makers can turn around the VFX and change the visual experience of the film when it finally hits the screens in Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, and Kannada? According to a top VFX professional, not quite.
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The expert said the makers deserve credit to even attempt to mount an ambitious film like Adipurush on the big screen. “It takes years to even have a vision like this. The fact that they were able to do this is a milestone that has been crossed. It takes a lot of money, a lot of talents, big banners, professionals from diverse fields to piece it together,” the source told indianexpress.com.
Mere intent, however, doesn’t guarantee a great output and according to the expert, any VFX-heavy film today comes under excruciating scrutiny as there are immediate comparisons with global films. Adipurush, then, is no different.
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“Everyone these days is familiar with Hollywood content. Everybody today talks about VFX, almost like a comparison chart. ‘Oh that Aqua man-like scene, where Prabhas is meditating underwater’. Earlier, people would recall, now they edit clips and compare simultaneously, frame by frame.
“It takes 5-6 years to make Avengers Endgame, which has 25-30 top VFX studios backing it. How can we save it now? Coming from the VFX industry I can tell you that the good thing is this was just a teaser of a massive vision. The best thing to do now is to postpone the release. Because if it releases in January, it will be like a longer duration of what we saw.”
Explaining the technical reasons why “refining” the VFX can be a task now, the source said that process would require a huge sum of money and a lot of time, the latter which Adipurush clearly doesn’t have if it still intends to stick to its January date. “When you create creatures (characters) on paper, then create them in 3D and then go into shot production, it is a process you cannot come back to, to again create or refine your creatures.
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“If you do that, then you are messing up with your whole process and redoing a series of things– which will need money and time. This is a huge film. We don’t get to see movies like this every year. These films scale up our industry, set a benchmark. They take a lot of time to be made and they should be given their due time.”
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An insider working on the film told indianexpress.com that seven-eighth studios are involved in mounting Adipurush’s VFX. “It is a wide area work, where every shot is broken down and is being worked upon by different agencies,” the insider added. So, if a group is working on developing creatures, motion capture is done somewhere else, concept is done at one place and the output at some other place.
According to the insider, Adipurush falls in the “conventional bracket of a live action film” (involving real people which are not produced by computer graphics) and does not use motion capture (the process of recording the movement of objects or people), a technology which James Cameron used extensively for his 2009 blockbuster Avatar and was also seen in Rajinikanth starrer Kochadaiiyaan, a box office dud.
Explaining the difference between the two ways to shoot a film, the VFX professional shared, “When you are trying to make photoreal creatures, which are done in 3D, the first thing we try to replicate are the movements. How we move in reality is a live action film. Now, if I want to transfer my movement to a 3D creature, that’s done by motion capturing.
“But that’s just the animation. Through motion capturing, we cannot replicate the look and feel, the lighting, the texture, the hair and fur of the creature. All these things combined make a believable creature. So, everything has to be spot on.”
This is the area where Adipurush’s teaser has found itself in trouble, visually. A lot of its characters–from lord Hanuman to some of the animals shown in the video unit–don’t pass off as convincing. The teaser, according to the source, is riddled with “basic problems” which even the laymen has caught.
“If you see Hanuman ji flying, the hair and fur, the texture of his face, all that is looking gimmicky. There is a difference between content on TV, OTT and films. On TV, when we saw non-realistic creatures in Ramayana back in the day, we accepted it because our vision was set like that. TV anyway is not that grand a medium where people will spend so much time, money and resources.
“But for feature films, you cannot compromise on these things. There are problems in the animation, the foreground and background are not matching, the perspectives ae wrong. These are basic problems.”
Screengrab of Lord Hanuman from the upcoming Adipurush. (Photo: Screenshot, T-Series/YouTube)
Multiple film marketing experts indianexpress.com spoke to within the industry said the best way for the Adipurush team to go forward now is to focus on a fresh campaign which relies more on some of its best visual frames. The trailer, all the marketing sources said, is the key.
“It really now comes down to the trailer, they can still turn the tide in their favour by cracking it. Ideally, they should have followed the Brahmastra model: Where Ayan Mukerji introduced the film’s world to the audience, one video at a time. Make the visual experience the central point, show behind the scenes footage, introduce its visual world to the audience.
“Certainly, that must be in their plan, but if something was done even before the teaser was out, it would have set a certain expectation. Now a great, power packed trailer can still do the trick. Not all is lost,” the source added.
