It’s been more than a decade since filmmaker Onir’s critically acclaimed I Am released. The film bagged two National Awards — Best Hindi film and Best Lyrics (Agar Zindagi) — and was lauded for stellar performances by Juhi Chawla, Manisha Koirala, Sanjay Suri, Nandita Das and Rahul Bose among others. Now, Onir is making a sequel to the anthology film. Titled We Are, the film will be a celebration of queer love and rights, shares Onir.

“It’s a sequel in terms of the essence. It won’t be a continuation of what was depicted in I Am, nor is the story being taken forward. In We Are, which too is an anthology of four films, the stories progress parallelly, before merging with each other. However, what remains constant in the sequel is the cities — Bengaluru, Kashmir, Mumbai, and Kolkata,” says Onir, adding that he wants the film to be independent in spirit.

Kubbra Sait and Malayalam actress Nimisha Sajayan have been cast in the film, but details about the rest of the cast are still under wraps. However, Onir shares that the film will have a trans person playing a prominent role.

Onir says, “You will see a mix of established, fantastic actors like Kubbra and Nimisha, along with some fresh talent. For the story that focuses on Kashmir, I wanted to cast someone who is actually from Kashmir, to bring originality to the character. We auditioned a lot of artistes from the region and finalised one. Similarly, for another story in the film that talks about a trans woman, we auditioned many actors from the trans community and I take pride in saying that I will be among the few filmmakers who will have a real trans woman acting in their film. The actor is undergoing training for the part. You will see also see two drag artistes and people from various regions of India in the film.”

Six languages will be spoken in the film, including Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Kashmiri, Malayalam, and Punjabi, and the filmmaker says that they have ensured that characters in the film are played by actors from the parts of the country that the respective stories are based in.

When asked if finding actors from the queer community was difficult, Onir says, “We have to make an effort to find them and be open to giving them a platform. There is immense talent among queer artistes, but for the longest time, they have been sidelined. We had to audition at least 40 people to finalise one actor. It is the job of a filmmaker to do workshops to prepare their actors. When I can do it for my Kashmiri actor, who is new and raw, why can’t I do the same for the trans actor in my film?”

The filmmaker stresses that while We Are touches up the issue of identity and human rights, the prevalent theme is celebrating the LGBTQIA+ community. “The film is about celebrating queer love. It is also my tribute to the Supreme Court for its historic judgement of repealing Section 377 of the IPC. At the same time, the film will highlight how queer people are not treated equally in a democracy like ours. The fact that we are still fighting to legalise same-sex marriages tells us that we are far from being equal,” says Onir, on a concluding note.