Producer Dinesh Vijan has been building his horror comedy universe with Stree (2018), Roohi (2021) and Bhediya (2022). Director Aditya Sarpotdar’s Munjya is the latest addition. While the film stars Abhay Verma and Sharvari, one of its highlights is that the central character is entirely built using CGI, making it among the first few Hindi movies to have a VFX creation as the lead. The director says, “This idea stemmed from the desire to push technological boundaries in Indian cinema and offer a unique visual experience.”

After the story was developed in 2019, the makers approached visual effects studio DNEG and VFX supervisor Brad Minnich—who previously worked on Batman v Superman (2016), Aquaman (2018), and Justice League (2021)—to create the character. Over the next six months, Munjya was built as a bald, big-eyed creature with wiry hands and rapid movements. “We used advanced motion capture technology under the guidance of Brad. The team at DNEG and Brad helped me through the entire process, which involved conceptualisation, motion capture, rigging, animation, texture, lighting and composting.”