Bollywood

Ramayana Part 1: India's Most Expensive Film Arrives on 5 November, and the First Word Is Mixed

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By Siya Mehra, Entertainment Writer·October 30, 2026·6 min read

There has never been an Indian film like this one, at least not on paper. Nitesh Tiwari's Ramayana has cost more than any Indian film before it, has Hans Zimmer and A.R. Rahman on the score, and is opening around the world on the same day, through Sony Pictures. Part 1 arrives on 5 November, with Part 2 planned for Diwali 2027.

It's also a film carrying a lot of expectation, because almost everyone in India grew up with this story. The early signs are encouraging at the ticket counter and a little less so from the first audiences, who saw it at its premiere at the Academy Museum in Los Angeles on 27 October.

RAMAYANA: RISE OF A LEGEND - NEW TRAILER IN HINDI

Ramayana release date and where to watch

Ramayana Part 1 opens in cinemas worldwide on Thursday, 5 November 2026, the week before Diwali. It was first announced for Diwali itself, then moved forward, and Sony brought the overseas and Indian releases together on the same day. Paid preview shows on the evening of 4 November have been reported in India and North America but not officially announced, so check your local cinema.

It's releasing in five Indian languages, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam, and in an English version for international audiences, where it's called Ramayana: Rise of a Legend. It's in IMAX and 3D. It isn't streaming: it's a cinema-only release for now, and no digital date has been announced.

Ramayana cast: who plays who

Two pieces of casting stand out. Yash, the star of the KGF films, makes his Hindi film debut as Ravana, and he's also one of the film's two producers. And Arun Govil, who played Rama in Ramanand Sagar's Ramayan, the 1987 TV series that most Indian families still treat as the definitive version, now plays Rama's father, Dasharatha.

What Part 1 covers

Part 1 tells the first half of Valmiki's epic. Rama, the heir to the throne of Ayodhya, is trained by the sage Vishvamitra, strings Shiva's great bow to win Sita's hand, and is then sent into fourteen years of exile when his stepmother Kaikeyi calls in two old promises from his father. Sita and his brother Lakshmana go with him into the forest. It ends with Ravana, the king of Lanka, carrying Sita away, which sets up the war that Part 2 will tell.

The trailer suggests Tiwari is giving Ravana far more room than most retellings do: it opens on him, and on the boon from Brahma that made him so powerful, before Rama appears at all. Producer Namit Malhotra has compared the film's mix of fantasy and human drama to The Lord of the Rings and Gladiator.

Ramayana budget: Rs 4,000 crore for two films

Namit Malhotra has said the two parts together cost about $500 million, more than Rs 4,000 crore, and that he and Yash are funding it themselves. That makes it the most expensive Indian film ever made by a wide margin. Yash later explained that the figure covers both films and the cost of promoting them internationally, not just production. Either way, it's several times the budget of any previous Indian blockbuster, and it means the film has to work outside India as well as at home.

Advance booking and box office predictions

Bookings opened strongly. By 30 October, trade tracker Sacnilk counted about 3.48 lakh tickets sold for the first day in India, worth Rs 17.56 crore gross, and The Week reported worldwide pre-sales of about Rs 40 crore. Forecasts for the first day range widely, from around Rs 65 crore to more than Rs 100 crore net in India, depending on how the last few days of booking go. We'll add the real numbers here after the opening weekend.

First reactions from the premiere

The first audience saw the film at an invitation-only 3D screening at the Academy Museum's David Geffen Theatre in Los Angeles on 27 October, with Ranbir, Yash, Sai Pallavi, Tiwari and Malhotra in attendance. The reactions that followed were mixed rather than ecstatic. The scale, the visual effects and the action drew the most praise, and so did the two leads: Ranbir's restrained Rama reportedly moved some viewers to tears, and Yash's Ravana was called magnetic.

The doubts were about the heart of it. Several early viewers felt the film was more interested in its visuals than its emotions, that the devotional feeling people expect from this story was thinner than it should be, and that the music didn't land as hoped; Sai Pallavi's Sita drew less comment than the two men. These are early reactions, not reviews, and critics' verdicts will follow on release day.

The music: Hans Zimmer and A.R. Rahman

The score is Hans Zimmer's first work for an Indian film, written with A.R. Rahman, who has described the process as "terrifying" because of what the story means to people. Rahman added Sanskrit verses to Zimmer's themes, and the poet Kumar Vishwas wrote lyrics for the songs. The first song, "Jai Jai Ram", came out on Ganesh Chaturthi in September and "Ravana Tandav" on Dussehra, before the full album launched in Chennai on 21 October.

When is Ramayana Part 2?

The makers have said Part 2 will follow at Diwali 2027. Filming on it began in March 2026, and Ranbir has said it's already well along, but reports since have suggested its large battle scenes may need more time. No exact date has been announced. Malhotra has also talked about growing the two films into a wider franchise.

For more Hindi releases, see our Bollywood movies coverage, including the year's other big hit, Drishyam: The Conclusion.

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