Rajamouli unveiled his new film Varanasi at a massive event in Hyderabad, where Mahesh Babu’s powerful first look was released. The director also addressed frustration over leaked visuals and revealed the film is being created in a true IMAX format
Mahesh Babu
SS Rajamouli's next has been titled Varanasi. The grand announcement was made at the Globetreotter event in Hyderabad. The event saw over 50000 people in attendance. Primary cast members Priyanka Chopra, Prithviraj Sukumaran, and Mahesh Babu also graced the event.
Mahesh Babu is Rudhra in Varanasi
Mahesh Babu's first look from the film was unveiled at the event along with a teaser glimpse of over 3 minutes.
Take a look:
All that you wished to see… unfolds today… Here’s #Varanasi and its world. 🤗🤗🤗@ssrajamouli
— Mahesh Babu (@urstrulyMahesh) November 15, 2025
@priyankachopra @PrithviOfficial @mmkeeravaani @VaranasiMovie https://t.co/jfrpDhmmjd
SS Rajamouli expresses anger over leaked visuals of trailer
SS Rajamouli expressed frustration about clips being leaked and captured by drones while LED screen testing was going on. He said, "Let me explain what happened. We ambitiously decided to set up this massive LED screen and brought in the best LED panels. To power it all, we needed more than 45 generators. Yesterday, we were supposed to test everything, the cranes, the black cloth, the video. During the test, someone started capturing drone footage and uploaded our content onto social media as if it were from Netflix."
Expressing his frustration, he added, "That is one year of our hard work, thousands of hours from hundreds of people, and crores of rupees… all leaked because of one drone flying randomly. We couldn’t even test our video properly. We are scared of more leaks now. We took risk and it didn’t work. Power glitch is happening."
Prithviraj about Varanasi
At the event Prithviraj said, “This humongous crowd gathered here today to celebrate a piece of cinema that we all truly believe will eventually become our collective pride. It’s truly special to be part of this grand celebration. I think it was a couple of years ago when I was in fact, the mid of my own directorial when I got a message from Rajamouli Sir, ‘Hi Prithvi, this is SS Rajamouli. The character of the antagonist in my next film has come out exceedingly well and one of the finest characters I have conceived. Would you be interested in doing this.'”
“Five minutes into the narration I was blown away and for the rest of the three hours, I listen to it, not as an actor, listening to a narration pitch, but more like a little boy whose got his hands on the next edition of his favourite comic book. The scale, the vision, the ambition – everything was India’s greatest contemporary mainstream filmmaker pushing his own limits to never before territory, but truly took my breath away was audacity of the imagination.”
“It must be on the bucket list of pretty much every actor out there to one day feature in Rajamouli film, but little did I know that he was going to trust me with one of the most complex, the most emotionally and physically challenging characters that he’s ever thought of.Thank you sir for the trust, for the belief and for the absolutely torturous shooting process, I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
SS Rajamouli reveals Varanasi is shot for IMAX
SS Rajamouli said, “Firstly, I would like to thank the Rachakonda Police Department. KL Narayan garu, thank you for bringing Mahesh and me together. Usually, before my films, I hold a press meet and narrate the story – it became a tradition. But actually, I don’t do that for every film. For ‘Baahubali’, I didn’t. If there is scope, we will; if not, we won’t. For this film, we won’t. But we wanted to release an announcement video to set the expectations right. We planned it for March but couldn’t. Then the rains came… and now, on November 14, we are finally coming with that video. It’s becoming difficult to keep referring to it as “this film” without revealing the title.”
Lauding Superstar Krishna, he said, “I didn’t know much about the greatness of Superstar Krishna garu earlier. I was a fan of NTR garu, but after entering the industry, I understood Krishna garu’s legacy. To introduce a new technology, you must break many norms, and he did that with multiple films. Today, I am proud to say we are introducing a new format to Telugu cinema: a premium large-scale format, filmed for IMAX. You might think, “Aren’t there already IMAX films?” The ones we usually watch are blown-up versions of the CinemaScope print. But a few films, like ‘Baahubali’ and ‘RRR’, were actually shot, mastered, and VFX-finished specifically for the format. This film too is being created for IMAX in the truest sense.”
SS Vijayendra Prasad on Mahesh Babu's character
Writer SS Vijayendra Prasad said, "Sometimes you don’t know what to talk about, and sometimes you have so much to say that you still don’t know where to begin. When you come across a divine moment, like visiting Tirumala Balaji or witnessing the Himalayas, words fall short. There is a 30-minute action portion in this film, and while watching it, I was stuck… it felt like witnessing the 'Vishwaroopam' of Mahesh Babu. There is no CG, no RR, nothing. It was just Mahesh's performance, you will experience it yourselves. Is it me and Kanchi who wrote it, or Mahesh, Priyanka, and Prithviraj who performed it, or Rajamouli who directed it? No. It feels like the Gods are making this film happen. Lord Hanuman is supporting Mahesh and taking us all forward. We are just squirrels contributing our small share."
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