Stop talking about render farms and balance sheets.
Salman Khan wants Indian cinema to talk about the actual story. Speaking at the trailer launch of his upcoming feature Maatrubhumi: May War Rest in Peace, the actor took direct aim at the relentless spectacle talk dogging director Nitesh Tiwari’s upcoming adaptation of Ramayana. Khan argued that reducing an ancient epic to its reported ₹4,000 crore production budget and endless digital trickery cheapens its cultural weight.
"I just think Ramayana ka charcha Ramayana pe hona chahiye na ki VFX and cost of production par," Khan said, cutting through months of trade chatter. "I just don't think that is correct. Ram ke upar baat karo, uski quality par."
Tiwari's ambitious two-part cinematic adaptation has spent over a year under an intense industry spotlight. The production locks in Ranbir Kapoor as Lord Ram, Sai Pallavi as Sita, and Yash as Ravana—a marquee lineup that instantly triggered feverish speculation across the trade. Yet public conversation around the production has leaned heavily into mechanical scale, zeroing in on staggering financial numbers, international crew hires, and computer generation. Khan rejected that packaging entirely.
He pointed out that Ram was never merely a warrior on a battlefield. Ram was a devoted son, a faithful husband, a committed father, and a principled soldier. Khan noted that the protagonist in his own war-focused feature, Maatrubhumi, was framed around those exact virtues.
Whether the Hindi film industry can unhook itself from marketing hype remains an open challenge. With Maatrubhumi preparing for its theatrical rollout and Tiwari’s Ramayana deep in production, audiences will soon determine whether character weight can still outshine sheer digital spectacle.