What is it about spiritual cinema that can make audiences turn up in large numbers even when there is little of the conventional stardom, spectacle or marketing machinery that usually drives a theatrical release? Hanuman Ansh may have offered the latest answer.
The film, centred on the life and spiritual journey of Neem Karoli Baba, did not arrive in theatres with the obvious ingredients of a commercial success. It opened quietly on August 7, 2026, with reported first day collections of around Rs 10 lakh. Yet the film steadily gathered momentum through word of mouth and has gone on to cross the Rs 50 crore mark, a remarkable result for a film reportedly made on a budget of around Rs 2 crore.
The numbers are impressive, but the more interesting story is what appears to have driven them. Audiences did not suddenly discover a conventional movie star or a new fictional universe. They discovered a spiritual figure with whom many already had a connection, or about whom they had heard from family, devotees and the larger spiritual community. For such audiences, watching the film is not merely about following a story. There is an element of seeking, knowing, experiencing and perhaps even offering oneself to something they already believe in.
Just a year earlier, Laalo: Krishna Sada Sahaayate demonstrated how powerfully the connection with a deity can work in a contemporary theatrical environment. The Gujarati film did not have the conventional advantages of a major star driven release, yet it grew through audience word of mouth and became a landmark success, eventually crossing the Rs 100 crore mark. Its story is fictional, but Lord Krishna is not. The emotional familiarity already exists.
And perhaps that is the crucial distinction. The audience does not have to be convinced that the central spiritual figure matters. That relationship may already be there.
Go back to 1977 and Shirdi Ke Sai Baba presents another striking example. The film was built around a spiritual figure who already had a devoted following across India. It went on to complete a silver jubilee, while its director Ashok Bhushan later recalled how deeply the film connected with audiences and even spoke of its impact on the spread of Sai Baba worship. The film was not creating Sai Baba’s relevance. It was bringing an existing faith into the cinema hall.
The phenomenon had already produced one of its biggest examples two years earlier with Jai Santoshi Maa. Made without the conventional star machinery of a major Hindi release, Jai Santoshi Maa became one of the biggest surprise successes of 1975. Its audience response went far beyond the ordinary moviegoing experience. Reports from the period describe viewers removing their footwear before entering theatres, offering flowers and coins towards the screen and treating screenings as something resembling a devotional gathering.
The significance of Hanuman Ansh therefore may lie in more than the film’s box office. It may be reminding the industry of something Indian audiences have demonstrated repeatedly across generations. Faith can create an audience in a way that publicity cannot always manufacture.
A conventional film has to sell its characters, its world and its promise. A spiritual film can sometimes begin with something much more powerful. The audience already knows the name. They may already know the stories. They may have visited the temple, heard the prayers, followed the teachings or grown up listening to the figure being discussed at home. The film then becomes a bridge between belief and experience.
This could also explain why word of mouth seems particularly potent in this space. With a regular commercial film, a viewer may tell another person that the film is entertaining, exciting or worth watching. With spiritual cinema, the recommendation can become much more personal. It can be about an experience, a feeling or a sense that something meaningful has been encountered.
That is perhaps what makes the journey from Jai Santoshi Maa to Shirdi Ke Sai Baba, then to Laalo and now Hanuman Ansh worth examining.
The films are separated by decades and are very different in form. But the common thread is that the audience is not being asked to develop faith in a fictional creation. The faith, or at least the curiosity surrounding the spiritual subject, already exists.
For a theatrical industry that increasingly struggles to persuade audiences to leave home, this is a significant distinction. Perhaps the biggest strength of spiritual cinema is not that it tells stories about faith. It is that, for a part of the audience, the faith itself is the reason to enter the theatre.
Hanuman Ansh may simply be the latest reminder of that enduring connection.
