The Vvaan Trailer Drops: Sidharth Malhotra and Tamannaah Enter Forest Folklore

Balaji Motion Pictures dropped the official trailer for The Vvaan: Force of the Forest on Sept. 16, giving audiences a first extended look at Sidharth Malhotra and Tamannaah Bhatia’s folklore fantasy ahead of a Sept. 25 theatrical release. India Today timed the 2-minute-44-second cut as the pair’s first on-screen pairing, blending romance, comedy, and horror inside a forest where ancient belief and supernatural force collide.

ABP Live framed the same drop as a “folk thriller” built on dark forest secrets, faith, and suspense, noting that social media reactions gravitated toward the folklore-plus-fear pitch and the Balaji/TVF creative fingerprints. Both outlets agree on the core setup: a forbidden forest whose night visitors may never return, a couple drawn into village ritual, and a development conflict that pits temple land against clearing plans.

India Today’s trailer breakdown opens on the Bhuttakas — “dark forces of nature, even darker than the night” — and the legend that anyone entering the forest after dark does not come out alive. Bhatia’s character presses for Chhath Puja holidays while Malhotra’s offers excuses, until she insists the goddess herself has called them. The cut then stages supernatural set pieces around the Vvaan Devi forest temple versus development pressure. After Malhotra’s character hits his head and loses consciousness, the trailer hints at a past-linked transformation and a mysterious bond with the woods that Bhatia’s character helps him interpret, including prayer sequences to Chhathi Maiya.

That religious calendar hook is not accidental. India Today noted the earlier song Chhathi Maiya already drew strong social response for its Chhath Puja imagery and its link to the film’s central deity. ABP Live’s reception roundup similarly highlighted viewers praising an “atmospheric” mix of faith, devotion, spirituality, humor, and tension — language that positions The Vvaan closer to contemporary Indian folk-horror than to remake mythology spectacles.

The creative team underlines that ambition. India Today credits director Deepak Kumar Misra with producers Shobha Kapoor and Ektaa Kapoor, listing supporting players Manish Paul, Shweta Tiwari, Sunil Grover, and Anup Soni. ABP Live additionally spotlighted Misra’s Panchayat pedigree and Arunabh Kumar / The Viral Fever association in its coverage of the trailer conversation, reinforcing expectations that the film will chase grounded emotion inside a heightened fantasy frame. Earlier marketing — a motion poster, comic-art reveal, and a Force of the Forest teaser — had already sketched possession, identity secrets, and a struggle for power inside the woods, India Today recalled.

Release timing has been a moving target. India Today charted the path from an announced Chhath Puja 2025 window to May 2026, then Aug. 28, and now Sept. 25 — a compressed final runway that makes today’s trailer the decisive awareness spike. For exhibitors, a late-September fantasy with festival-adjacent Chhath resonance and two bankable leads is a clear counterprogramming bet against Hollywood holdovers, provided word of mouth matches the trailer’s VFX scale.

Commercially, the first Malhotra–Bhatia pairing is the marketing spine. India Today stressed the on-screen couple debut; ABP Live’s user quotes leaned on chemistry and Sidharth’s “most complex role yet.” That combination — star pairing plus folk-horror world-building — is what Balaji is selling in the nine days between trailer and opening. Whether the film can convert trailer curiosity into opening-weekend footfall will depend on how cleanly the comedy, romance, and possession beats cohere once the full runtime lands.

For now, Sept. 16’s dual coverage from India Today and ABP Live locks the essentials: trailer out, Sept. 25 date firm, Vvaan Devi temple versus development as the central conflict, and a forest folklore engine designed to feel newly invented rather than recycled. Hindi cinema’s autumn slate just gained a high-concept fantasy that wants temple bells and jump scares in the same frame — and the trailer is the invitation.