Two eagerly watched releases offered their first public report cards this week, and the contrast was stark. Godzilla Minus Zero, Toho’s sequel to its Oscar-winning predecessor, is riding a wave of enthusiastic early reactions. Ramayana: Rise of a Legend, Nitesh Tiwari’s Hindi adaptation of the epic, has been praised for scale while drawing pointed criticism over its visual execution and length.
Godzilla Minus Zero starts with numbers
Toho held additional press screenings ahead of the Tokyo International Film Festival’s November 1 centerpiece gala. The sequel currently carries a 92% score based on 51 reviews, a striking point of comparison for a franchise that reset expectations when Godzilla Minus One won the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects in 2024 on a reported USD 15 million budget and more than USD 100 million worldwide.
Early viewers have focused on the emotional register and the IMAX staging. Several reactions describe the film as a worthy follow-up that expands the characters and post-war themes of Minus One while delivering large-scale kaiju sequences.
Ramayana: Rise of a Legend draws split notices
The film’s first Los Angeles screening kept reviews under embargo until October 30. The notices that followed are divided. Screen Rant called the film “an impressive cinematic achievement” on a visual and technical level, and IndieWire argued that only the word “epic” would suffice. IGN, however, said the film falls victim to clunky action, eye-sore CGI, and awkward AI lip-syncing in what is only a Part 1.
The tension between ambition and finish runs through the reactions:
- Technical scale and visual spectacle earn consistent praise.
- CGI quality and AI-assisted lip-sync are the sharpest points of criticism.
- The 3-hour-15-minute runtime leaves some critics feeling the story is overstuffed and might have worked better as a television adaptation.
What this means for the Diwali frame
The early overseas conversation matters because it shapes word of mouth before a wide global rollout. A 92% early score for Godzilla Minus Zero raises the premium-screen bar for any film releasing near it; strong IMAX reactions point towards audience demand for the large-format experience. For Ramayana, the split notices mean the film has to do more than look grand; it has to hold attention across its long runtime and convince viewers that Part 1 is a complete enough theatrical experience.
The clash appears less direct in India than the global headline suggests. Reports indicate Ramayana will get an undisputed run in Indian theatres, with Godzilla expected to move to a different release date there. But in the global conversation, the two films will remain paired as a test of scale, spectacle and critical credibility.
For Hindi cinema, a film of Ramayana’s budget and mythology is being asked to clear a higher bar: not just domestic scale, but credibility with global critics who are comparing its VFX and pacing with Hollywood and major Japanese franchise filmmaking. That is a shift from the older pattern where Indian blockbusters were judged largely by domestic box office.
Source: The Times of India
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