Bāhubali: The Beginning
Bāhubali: The Beginning
NR | 10 July 2015 (USA)
Bāhubali: The Beginning Trailers

The young Shivudu is left as a foundling in a small village by his mother. By the time he’s grown up, it has become apparent that he possesses exceptional gifts. He meets the beautiful warrior princess Avanthika and learns that her queen has been held captive for the last 25 years. Shividu sets off to rescue her, discovering his own origins in the process.

Reviews
Inclubabu Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.
Seraherrera The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity
Ogosmith Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.
Celia A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.
Gypsi Bates A baby is found in the river by a village that lives at the bottom of a gigantic waterfall. He is adopted, named Shivudu, and not told of his history. Shivudu (played by Prabhas) spends his life trying to climb to the top of the waterfall. When he finally succeeds, he finds the large kingdom of Mahishmati, and falls in love with a girl (played by Tamannaah) from a rebel group who are trying to rescue their queen from Mahishmati's evil king. Shivudu, brave and fearless, vows to rescue the queen himself.Despite the predictable plot, this Telugu action-drama is all around fantastic. The acting was solid, the scenery and settings gorgeous, and the music (songs and incidental) excellent. Some of the CGI animals weren't fully credible, but the rest of the CGI usage looked natural and impressive. The action scenes generally looked believable, and were always exciting. Overall, for viewers comfortable with violent action films, this is a movie not to be missed.
jakel-10-204876 Maybe it really appeals to Indian people but, for a western audience, it's just a really cheesy movie; bad acted, with a basic script, and a mustache wielding hero.I gave it a chance. Just don't bother. It's really far away from the score that IMDb is currently (8.2) showing for it.
DeadMan66 Very few movies are in Indian cinemas which are great and this movie is one of those. All the characters did there best. Every frame from starting till end says the great story of this film. Dialogues and songs are good.I will give 8 rating because it is fantasy movie and lot of hard work had been done in creating.
fourbyfour-72864 I was fascinated by the rave reviews for the two Baahubali movies so I decided to give them both a try. (Any movie scoring 8 or above on IMDb has a solid chance of being a winner.)What I have learned is that IMDb scoring is subject to the social media phenomenon of being skewed by an ardent fan base. In the case of Baahubali, the movie has been a huge hit in an isolated market, continental India. A billion Indians can't be wrong, but they sure can skew an IMDb rating when they vote as a bloc.While Baahubali is astounding audiences in its native homeland (there are some great articles about the movie's importance to the industry and to the North and South regions of the country), American audiences with their highly sophisticated expectations will most likely agree with me that the overall result is an immature, incredibly predictable, poorly executed, soap opera that does not merit its hype or its two-part 5 and half hour running time.MY OBSERVATIONS: Baahubali's story is intriguing as it presents to us a legendary super hero who appears to come from a rich and ancient history/lore. The source material is every bit as promising as heroes from Western culture (Samson, Superman, Hercules, etc.). However, the execution of the story turns great drama (love, family, betrayal, support from the gods, fall from grace) into a soap opera complete with cheesy reaction shots accompanied by shock music more appropriate for 1970s TV sitcoms with their spit takes and laugh tracks.The highly applauded visual effects are mediocre by American standards. Other reviewers have detailed these issues adequately so I will only add my support to their criticisms.The acting is hit or miss. Some scenes come across powerfully (love scenes, for example) while others (like those in the royal court) remind us of American TV sitcoms from the 1970s.BOTTOM LINE: If you are calibrated to fine cinema, are looking for a good epic, and are considering Baahubali, then do some research and enter into the viewing prepared to walk away. I, for one, wish I could get my 5 and half hours back.