RRR‘s worldwide rounds across cinemas and Netflix queues had to be one of the happiest accidents of the year. Following in the footsteps of Squid Game as a thinly-marketed release that somehow managed to blow up via word of mouth, the Tollywood musical action film rightfully shot for the stars and managed to hit quite a few, landing three nominations for the upcoming Saturn Awards in categories for Best Action/Adventure Film, Best International Film, and Best Director.
S.S. Rajamouli, the mastermind behind the camera and the film’s screenplay, was among those who were caught off guard by the film’s meteoric rise in popularity, but, in an interview with Empire, the director/screenwriter soon offered up plenty of plausible explanations for the development, ranging from the pandemic’s side effect of broadening the content horizons of audiences to the simple fact that RRR is just a damn good movie.
“When everything got shut down, the whole world started looking into different cultures, absorbing content from different countries, in different languages,” remarked Rajamouli, who would later go on to highlight his film’s “unapologetic action sequences” and “heroism” as other potential reasons for the film’s popularity.
And he’s earned every right to highlight his accomplishments; from the absolutely dazzling choreography and stunt work, to the downright insanity of some of the film’s scenes (Bheem’s raid on the palace with the help of some animal pals come to mind), to the well-earned heartfelt chemistry between its two leads, RRR more than justifies its three-hour runtime, and now Western audiences look primed to devour whatever Rajamouli decides to grace us with next.
RRR is currently available to stream on Netflix.