One of the year’s most popular movies rides a renewed wave of awards season buzz

Image via DVV Entertainment

Foreign-language films are all the rage nowadays, and while South Korea may still lead the proverbial charge after Parasite‘s Oscars sweep back in 2020, the hits coming out of Indian cinema are bringing its industry neck-and-neck with the best of them.

With the likes of Laal Singh Chaddha and Brahmāstra: Part One – Shiva making their theatrical rounds across a variety of genres, India’s success at the international box office has been nothing to sneeze at. However, we’d be remiss to forget about RRR, the Tollywood action epic that wowed audiences all over the world, particularly when it found its high-flying home on Netflix.

And now, with Oscars rumors beginning to drum themselves up, the support for RRR is beginning to bubble back up again as well. Per Variety‘s Oscars predictions, RRR currently sits in a “top-tier contender” position for the Academy Award for Best Picture, while the film’s leads, N.T. Rama Rao Jr. and Ram Charan Teja, just might refuse to pull any punches for the Best Actor honors. It is also, of course, one of the favorites to nab the Best International Feature award.

Written and directed by S. S. Rajamouli and made on a budget worth $72 million (the most expensive Indian film ever made), RRR chronicles the plight and friendship of two historical revolutionaries, Alluri Sitarama Raju (Charan) and Komaram Bheem (Rama Rao) in their fight against British colonials. The film is a historical fiction piece, dreaming up what the two men may have accomplished if they ever met in real life; evidently, it would have been an unbreakable bond of friendship matched only by their combined tenacity in combat.

RRR is available to stream on Netflix. The 95th Academy Awards ceremony will begin on March 12, 2023.