HanuMan director Prasanth Varma talks about his superhero film, achieving the VFX on a limited budget, and the learnings hew drew from other films in the genre.
HanuMan has been the big cinematic story of 2024 so far. The unheralded Telugu film has already grossed over Rs 100 crore worldwide in under a week of its release. Made on a shoestring budget, the film has beaten other big-budget extravaganzas at the box office, and won fans’ hearts too. In an exclusive chat with DNA, the film’s director Prasanth Varma talks about how he went about creating this world, the learnings he took from other films’ failures, and the secret behind the film’s VFX.
HanuMan is not the first Indian film based on the Ramayana in the last one year. Adipurush and Ram Setu, both famously came and flopped hard, and also received criticism of their handling of Indian mythology and religious icons. But Prasanth says Telugu cinema has never had that problem. “In Telugu cinema, we had many films retelling stories from Ramayana and Mahabharata. NTR sir had done so many such films. There was never this problem. People always celebrated those films. For us, NTR sir was Krishna and many households would have his pictures instead of idols. We never went wrong in representing Gods as an industry,” says the filmmaker.
Prasanth says he watched other films to take ideas on both what to do and what not to. “I watch all kinds of films in the genre that I am working on so that I learn how to make a film from some of them and I will learn how not to make a film from others. Everything has to be done differently to achieve different results,” he tells us.
Prasanth attributes this sensitivity towards religion among Telugu filmmakers to their upbringing, adding, “Probably it’s the upbringing and how we grow up with these stories. So, we are sensitive about that and attached to it. I cannot speak for other filmmakers but I would never tamper with the histories of our culture. I really wanted to retell Ramayana and Mahabharata in my way. But I feel I am not matured enough as a filmmaker and experienced enough to do that. So, I am creating new fictional stories inspired by those characters.”
HanuMan tells the story of Hanumant, a village boy who acquires the powers of Lord Hanuman. The superhero film is being praised for its VFX, achieved on a rather limited budget. Prasanth reveals how they managed it, “Since we didn’t have the money to spend, only thing we had was time. Instead, we spent time planning it, finding talent, fine-tuning the shots. We spent more time on all this than any of the other big films to get everything as perfect as possible.”
HanuMan lays the foundation for a brand new cinematic universe. The climax of the film teases a sequel, which will arrive in 2025. Talking about the future of the franchise, Prasanth says, “Most of the superheroes that we see in the western culture have similar powers to what our Gods have, the characters in our itihaasa have. Hanuman ji is one of the most loved and respected figures there. When we started creating this new universe of superheroes that get their powers from our gods, we felt we should start with Hanuman ji, and then go from there.”
