“It’s taken me over nine years, a large chunk of my life and a lot of blood, sweat, toil and tears to make Agra,” filmmaker Kanu Behl shares over a phone call, “I couldn’t have let this go.” Agra, which won Best Indie Film at the Indian Film Festival of Melbourne and premiered at the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight to critical acclaim, is a psychological drama, exploring sexuality and loneliness. Earlier this week, after being given severely limited screenings for his film—only 70 screens across the country—the filmmaker took to social media to call out the “long-standing systemic pattern affecting all independent films in India”: the denial of theatrical access.

His post immediately found support within the community, with 46 filmmakers, including Chaitanya Tamhane, Payal Kapadia, Shaunak Sen, Vasan Bala, co-signing a statement demanding fair access for independent films.

“The group is expanding as we speak,” Behl told Mirror, “We are now in the process of forming a body that will come together to talk about our collective rights.”

Directors Alankrita Shrivastava and Arati Kadav, co-signees to the statement, say their solidarity stems from having experienced similar helplessness. Shrivastava remembers the difficulty she faced in getting a theatrical release for her film Turning 30 (2011), a romantic comedy, starring Gul Panag, revolving around an ad executive who gets dumped and has her ideas stolen before her 30th birthday.

“We got screens in certain places where the film honestly did not have any resonance, whereas we needed more screens in places where the film was doing well,” she says.

For Kadav, who found OTT fame with Mrs (2023) — a remake of the Malayalam film, The Great Indian Kitchen — bootstrapping her career had been the norm for the longest time. Her sci-fi fantasy film Cargo (2019), starring Vikrant Massey and Shweta Tripathi, set aboard a spaceship where souls of the deceased arrive before they are prepared for reincarnation, went to over 25 festivals, including the Miami International Science Fiction Film Festival (MiSciFi).

“Though it was lapped up by everyone outside India, I struggled with distribution for about one-and-a-half years. I had put in a lot of money into this project, and felt quite dejected,” she says.

While the film didn’t get a theatrical release — Kadav says she understands “theatrical reservations for some festival films”, though the need of the hour is to find “incentives for them”—it was eventually picked up by Netflix where it had a decent five-year run. Having the backing of an industry powerhouse like Anurag Kashyap, who was among Cargo’s many co-producers helped. “I got lucky,” Kadav admits.

The fight at the ground level for independent films is getting harder with each passing year, says Kimaya Hemdev, director and head of acquisition at Star Entertainment Pvt Ltd. “Companies that were once only theatre owners have now also become distributors. So, you’re competing with a distributor who also has the bargaining power of a theatre,” she explains.

When producers, distributors and exhibitors are the same people, it creates a monopoly—one where, she says, “there’s a clear preference for the films they distribute, especially studio movies.”

Quality time slots and cinemas are carved out for the big studio films, which are also exonerated from paying a Virtual Print Fee —a charge producers pay to exhibitors to help cover the costs of converting to digital cinema projectors — which Hemdev says is anywhere between Rs 25,000-Rs 50,000 per screen, per show, and can be prohibitive for independent filmmakers. If a film had to run for a week with a single show daily, it would translate to Rs 3.5 lakh approx.

The long-held argument that there’s no audience for independent films, Behl says, is “fallacious”. “On Tuesday night, when I finally got a show [for Agra] at PVR Citi Mall in Andheri, there were 119 people who came to watch it,” he says.

According to Shrivastava, what’s happening right now is neither fair to independent films, nor the audience. “If the audience can’t access these films, how will they ever get a taste of another kind of cinema?”

Vishek Chauhan, CEO of Rupbani Cinemas, Purnia, Bihar, says that ultimately, “the programming power lies only with the audience.” He stresses that no exhibitor in their right mind would deliberately refuse a good film that promises viewership, because theatres operate as businesses and decisions depend on demand and viability. He finds it unfair to pin the blame solely on exhibitors.

Theatrical success, he says, is no longer the only metric of a film’s performance. The majority of the viewers consume films at home on OTT or television, with theatre earnings form only “12–20 per cent of a film’s overall pie.” Therefore, he says, forcing exhibitors to run films with low turnout “jeopardizes other films that could do better.”

Down South, in the Malayalam film industry, filmmakers working with novel scripts have tried to negotiate the system to reach the right kind of viewers. A case in point is the 2023 National Award-winning drama Aattam, written and directed by Anand Ekarshi, which turns the spotlight on a theatre group whose sole actress faces sexual assault by one of the men. According to him, “shooting and making the film is actually the easiest part; releasing the film is the toughest.”

As an early business strategy, Ekarshi raised funds to make a 10-minute pilot of his film to show producers. “The idea was to give them a glimpse of the script, understand the characters, and see what the actors could pull off.” Joy Movie Productions came on board soon after. Aattam, despite its experimental nature, turned into commercial project. It was made on a shoestring budget of Rs 3 crore, of which Rs 80 lakh was dedicated solely to marketing—the movie enjoyed a successful theatrical run and bagged a prime OTT release.

Meanwhile, the theatre run of Prasanth Vijay’s Ithiri Neram, a romantic drama starring Zarin Shihab and Roshan Mathew, earlier this month in Kerala has been hard-won. Vijay has made two critically acclaimed films before, Athisayangalude Venal and Daayam, funded by a school friend and his wife respectively, which didn’t make it to theatres. He tried to cut the risks with Ithiri Neram by getting a producer — Jomon Jacob of Mankind Cinemas and four others — who shared his sensibility. “Even after the film was made, it took a while to find the right distributor,” he says.

“But I waited, because I wanted the film to reach the last mile, even if it were fewer theatres.” The goal was also to be able to get a good OTT platform for wider reach. The film opened in 60 theatres in the first week of November and continues to reach newer audiences.

The fact that the Kerala state government has taken up initiatives to support the arts, has also come to the aid of filmmakers. Debutante filmmaker Sivaranjini J won a Rs 1.5 crore woman’s empowerment programme grant for her film, Victoria in 2022 — there is no such equivalent grant in Maharashtra for women. The production was taken care of by the Kerala State Film Development Corporation and the movie, when it releases next week, will be shown across eight government-run theatres in major cities. A government grant comes with its own set of challenges with filmmakers having to deal with red-tapeism and mounds of paperwork. “But it gives you a good start,” she admits.

Meenakshi Shedde, Senior Programming Advisor-South Asia at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) and South Asia Delegate to the Berlin Film Festival for 27 years, says that in contrast with Bollywood, Kerala has a very strong grassroots film movement.

“Even the rice farmers know their cinema, and that’s unthinkable in most parts of the country,” she says, adding “that the International Film Festival of Kerala and film societies have played a huge role in shaping their taste”.

Internationally, independent American production house A24 has been backing indie and artistically driven films in its attempt to push high-quality cinema. Closer home, Manish Mundra, filmmaker and founder-producer, Drishyam Films has emerged as an unlikely champion of independent films — Masaan (2015) and Newton (2017) are part of the success story.

“For things to change, everyone must play a part. Producers and distributors cannot do it alone. Audiences need to show up for these films, and the government needs to recognize that cinema is a cultural resource. We need more single screens, art-house theatres and community spaces across the country, and not just urban and expensive multiplexes focused on mainstream releases,” Mundra says.

Shedde believes that independent filmmakers should also tap into movements taking place within cities like Mumbai, that provide platforms to showcase good, quality cinema. “Film Heritage Foundation and VHS [Versova Homage Screenings], for instance, regularly screen indie productions and also get audiences for these screenings.” She stresses the need for filmmakers to think more about “how to help create an audience for their films as well.

Karan Talwar, filmmaker and co-founder of Harkat Studios, has for the last decade been building an alternative community-driven space for independent and experimental films. “Harkat now screens nine to 10 films a month under our independent calendar, with guest curators and rotating themes,” he says. They operate on a 50-50 box-office sharing model, to help filmmakers earn revenue.

“We are seeing a massive uptick of people who want to come in for these screenings,” he says, adding. He believes that the one way to fight this system is to make new inroads and find new friends.

It has been a whirlwind week for Kiran Rao, whose film Laapataa Ladies, on September 23, was announced as India’s official entry to the Oscars 2025. What has life been like since then? All about congratulatory calls, messages and planning, says the proud director.

She begins, “I was in disbelief at first when my cousin Shiv [Aroor, journalist] posted the news on our family’s [WhatsApp] group. The first person I called was Aamir [Khan], of course. I would like to believe I informed Aamir, but the reality is that we got a hold of each other only about 30 minutes later because the calls and messages were pouring in. He was thrilled, and his first reaction was, ‘The journey ahead is very long and we must start planning.’”

From hosting screenings in the US to having press conferences, the next steps will be crucial in determining whether Laapataa Ladies—starring Pratibha Ranta, Nitanshi Goel, Sparsh Shrivastava and Ravi Kishan—makes the cut to the Best International Feature Film category or not. Fortunately, she has the perfect guide in Khan, whose Lagaan (2001) remains among the three Indian movies to have ever made it to the top five nominations in that category in the Oscars.

The director shares, “With Aamir having done this before, his knowledge, insight and experience are invaluable. When he heard the news, he immediately started brainstorming about the next steps. I know how meticulous he can be, and that is a huge strength.”

Rao’s plan is to follow in Khan and director Ashutosh Gowariker’s footsteps, who had created tremendous pre-Oscar buzz around Lagaan in 2002. She intends to fly to Los Angeles by the year-end and set the campaign into motion.

“Right now, it’s about building a strong strategy. From Shaunak Sen to Amit Masurkar and Ashutosh Gowariker, so many directors whose films were competing in previous years have offered advice and support. Not just me, the entire team will be travelling to present our film. Being there on ground will make it easier to be a part of key events and conversations. We want to give it our all.”

Had she imagined being Oscar-bound when the script first came to her? She recalls that Khan had brought the story to her from the Cinestaan India’s Storytellers Contest. She shares, “Aamir found this gem at a script writing competition and gave it to me to read. When he told me about it, I was instantly hooked. For me, as a filmmaker,  it was a story that I believed needed telling.”

All That Breathes director Shaunak Sen says he has been flooded with messages of support after his climate change documentary lost out to Navalny at the Oscars. “So many chin-uppy messages of encouragement/support since yesterday. We were low for about an hour, but we’re soon distracted into equanimity amidst the whirl of glittery people and things. Brain is still to wrap around the fact that this is the end of this chapter,” the director wrote on Instagram.

“Next we’ll be working hard to figure India distribution,” he wrote of the film that’s yet to release in India, adding, “For now, very very nice to share this bizarre, swollen day with the brothers, and so many members of our crew. Hugest congratulations to the winning films from India!”

Naatu Naatu from RRR and The Elephant Whisperers emerged as winners in the Original Song and Documentary Short Film categories at the 95th Academy Awards on Sunday. The documentary previously won the World Cinema Grand -Jury Prize: Documentary at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival and the Golden Eye award for the best documentary at the 2022 Cannes.

Set in Delhi, All That Breathes follows siblings, Mohammad Saud and Nadeem Shehzad, who have devoted their lives to rescuing and treating injured birds, especially black kites. The director says, “Anyone who lives in Delhi is aware of the air as kind of a dark and tactile object. I did not think that I was making a film on air pollution at all. The basis of the story is the relationship between the brothers and how they continue treating so many birds, second – the broader landscape of Delhi, and third – the bird itself.”

--------------------------------------------

Of the three Indian entries for the 95th Academy Awards — two documentaries and a feature film — nominated in different categories, two brought home the coveted trophy. Guneet Monga Kapoor’s The Elephant Whisperers and the song Naatu Naatu from RRR (2022) won awards in their respective categories. However, Shaunak Sen’s All That Breathes (ATB) lost to Daniel Roher’s Navlany in the Best Documentary Feature Film category. Following this, Sen penned a heartfelt Instagram post with a series of pictures in the order of how “the day progressed”.

Taking the loss with a pinch of salt, Sen and his team posed with a moping face. His last Insta Story also showed the actual celebration by the team showing “how it actually ended”. He acknowledged the “chin-uppy messages of encouragement” and wrote, “We were low for about an hour, but were soon distracted into equanimity amid the whirl of glittery people and things. Brain is still to wrap around the fact that this is the end of this chapter.” 

Sen’s carousel featured team pictures gracing the champagne carpet and his caption read, “For now, very very nice to share this bizarre, swollen day with the brothers and so many members of our crew.” Sen extended accolades to the winning Indian films too.  

All That Breathes, a documentary addressing climate change in India, previously won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Documentary at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival and the Golden Eye award for the best documentary at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival.

Having attended the Oscar nominees’ luncheon this year as a member of the Academy, actor Ali Fazal says meeting Hollywood creative forces such as actors Tom Cruise and Brendan Fraser motivates him to push himself as an artiste.

“I got to meet such wonderful talent from all across the board, and I have watched all of their work. It was a real honour to just have a nice, relaxed afternoon with everyone,” Fazal tells us.

On Wednesday, the 36-year-old Instagrammed pictures from the luncheon, including happy moments with filmmakers Guneet Monga and Shaunak Sen, both of whom have received nods for their documentaries, The Elephant Whisperers and All That Breathes, respectively.

“There are just too many cherished memories from the lunch. Getting fist bumps from Tom Cruise is definitely top of the list, and so is sharing notes with Martin McDonagh (filmmaker) — whose plays I have performed on stage. It was nice to meet Brendan Fraser and a lot of other people out there, and learn that they know of my work. It is encouraging for an actor like me and has been the biggest takeaway from the luncheon,” says the actor, who has found a fan following in the West after starring in Victoria & Abdul (2017) and Death On The Nile (2022).

Talking about his role as an Academy member, Fazal says, “My responsibilities and that of all Indian members is to be on the global stage. Indian Academy members have a role to play in storytelling across the globe,” Fazal shares, adding that he is rooting for the country at the awards this year.

“I am championing all the nominations. We’ve had a great representation from India. All That Breathes (2022) is one of the best films I have seen — and I am not saying this because it is from India and I know the team,” he signs off.

------------------------------

History has been created. RRR, directed by S S Rajamouli, has bagged a nomination at the prestigious Academy Awards for Naatu Naatu (Best Original Song category). And as far as cherries on the cake go, there is not one but two — Shaunak Sen’s All That Breathes (Best Documentary Feature) and Guneet Monga Kapoor-produced The Elephant Whisperers (Documentary Short Subject), too, bagged nods.

In a celebratory note, Rajamouli wrote, “The main reason is Taarak (Jr NTR) and (Ram) Charan’s sync and style.” He acknowledged Naatu Naatu’s dance routine, which people have tried to recreate all over the world. “Sorry for the torture but I will not hesitate to do it again,” he further wrote about the song, which will compete against Applause from Tell It Like A Woman (2022), starring Jacqueline Fernandez.

M M Keeravaani, who composed the song, told Deadline, “The Oscars involve the dreams of artistes from all over the world, which is not a joke. I’m very proud to be nominated for the first time from [South] Asia in this music category. I’m thrilled.”

Kapoor tweeted, “This film is an ode to devotion and love..an ode to selfless love for the beautiful baby ellie Raghu who felt all the emotions like us humans but only two could hear his whispers - Bomman and Bellie (sic).”

The awards show will take place on March 13, and fans will look forward to seeing the golden statuette (or statuettes!) home this time.

“There is something really hypnotic about the human-animal relationship, especially human and avian, philosophically as well as emotionally. I found that incredibly interesting and I wanted to explore that,” says filmmaker Shaunak Sen, who has spent the last week under the spotlight, and rightfully so. His documentary All That Breathes has won the 2022 L’Oeil d’Or, also known as The Golden Eye award, at the recently concluded Cannes Film Festival 2022.

Amidst his chaotic schedule of prancing between panels and screenings, Sen finds a small window to speak to mid-day about his real-life film that has bagged the festival’s top prize for documentaries. The Delhi-based filmmaker’s first feature length documentary Cities Of Sleep (2015) dived into the infamous “sleep mafia” of Delhi and highlighted how securing a safe sleeping spot often becomes a question of life and death for homeless people in the capital city. This time, he captured the life of two brothers, Nadeem Shehzad and Mohammad Saud, and their work of rescuing and treating birds, especially black kites, out of their basement-turned-bird hospital in Wazirabad, a village in Delhi NCR.

“We read about these two brothers who had saved over 25,000 black kites so far. They were the first ones we interviewed and we stuck with them. Even their crammed and damp basement where they work is inherently cinematic. The story as a whole was like a trifecta of the ecological aspect in a poetic and lyrical form,” says Sen over a telephonic chat from Tel Aviv.

This is not the first time that the documentary has found itself under the spotlight. In January, it won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Documentary at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. The praise that the film received from the jury at Cannes is also noteworthy. “L’OEil d’Or goes to a film that, in a world of destruction, reminds us that every life matters, and every small action matters. You can grab your camera, you can save a bird, you can hunt for some moments of stealing beauty, it matters. It’s an inspirational journey in observation of three Don Quixotes who may not save the whole world but do save their world,” read the note shared by the jury on the official website.

The director, who is still processing the win and the praise coming his way, says it was humbling even being nominated along some of the best documentary makers. All That Breathes competed against Chilean documentarian Patricio Guzman’s My Imaginary Country, which looks at mass protests that exploded in Santiago in 2019 when citizens took to the streets demanding better democracy and social equality; and, Ethan Coen’s Jerry Lee Lewis: Trouble in Mind, which presents the story of the great wild man of rock and roll Lewis, among other films.

“This was an unusually difficult film to make, taking over three years and alongside deep personal losses for the crew. We’re thrilled that the film is getting these honours.” 

Interestingly, the documentary has had three cinematographers working on it at different stages, something that Sen feels worked in its favour. “Initially, it was Saumyananda Sahi but when the shooting schedule did not match his timeline, we got Riju Das on board. He added a visual grammar to the film with his tilt and pan shots. We were also extremely lucky to work with Ben Bernand, a German filmmaker, who changed the visual grammar with his long cut shots, adding a stillness to the film, which aptly depicts the passage of time,” he shares.

Before setting off to attend yet another panel at the Docaviv International Documentary Film FestivalTel Aviv, Sen admits being overjoyed with the response coming his way for the big win. “Congratulatory messages have also been pouring from actors and filmmakers like Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Ranveer Singh, Shekhar Kapur; responses from Vikramaditya Motwane and Anand Gandhi have been extremely warm.”

Delhi-based filmmaker Shaunak Sen’s documentary All That Breathes, which is set in Delhi, has won the L’Oeil d’Or – the top documentary award at Cannes. The documentary, which premiered in the Special Screening segment at the Cannes Film Festival, also won the ‘World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Documentary’ at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival.

Shaunak, who is still processing this victory, says, “It’s a blur and life takes on a dizzying kind of density which is unprecedented at least for me. I’m not used to any of this (the spotlight). I’m shy and reclusive, especially on social media. It’s not that I’m constantly posting about stuff. It doesn’t come easy to me. Of course, I’m grateful for everything that happened. We all are thrilled, but also I’m constantly trying to steal moments of quiet and calm as much as I can.”

The documentary has long sequences of rats, turtles and other forms of wildlife in Delhi as Shaunak wanted to narrate the story of all that breathes.

Shaunak says that the film’s title gestures toward the kinship that is inherent in living beings. “It’s like ontological neighbourliness between different species,” he says.

The description of the documentary states — from their makeshift bird hospital in their tiny basement, the ‘kite brothers’ care for thousands of these mesmeric creatures that drop daily from New Delhi’s smog-choked skies. As environmental toxicity and civil unrest escalate, the relationship between this Muslim family and the neglected kite forms a poetic chronicle of the city’s collapsing ecology and rising social tensions.

Shaunak adds, “Anyone who lives in Delhi is acutely aware of air as kind of a dark and tactile object. But even in the farthest reaches of my imagination, I did not think that I was making a film on air pollution at all. The basis of the story is the relationship between the brothers and how they continue treating so many birds every day, second — the broader landscape of Delhi, and third — the bird itself which I was interested in.”

All That Breathes is a collaboration between an Indian director, a German DOP (Director of photography), and a Danish film editor. Shaunak’s visual narrative in the documentary has been inspired by Russian director Viktor Kossakovsky’s work as he wanted to bring that narrative to show Delhi’s apocalyptic background. Critics have praised the ‘fantastic macro cinematography’ of the documentary on which three DOPs — Ben Bernhard, Riju Das, and Saumyananda Sahi — worked.

Shaunak says that his idea was “to render the scientific into the poetic”. He says, “The documentary is a poetic sort of formulation that includes the scientific, social and the emotional.”

In an interview with a film magazine, Ben Bernhard spoke about one of the most difficult shots of the documentary — the opening sequence. He was quoted as saying, “Shaunak and I wanted to not only show the rats but to be in the middle of them while connecting the animals to the city life.”

The film was mostly edited in Copenhagen by Danish film editor Charlotte Munch Bengtsen. Shaunak says, “She wanted to find a structure between extreme compression — which is the claustrophobic basement of the brothers, and decompression — the vista of the city itself.”

Talking about Mohammad Saud and Nadeem Shehzad, the brothers on whom Shaunak has based the documentary, he says, “It’s a deep kind of friendship where they have opened their lives to me and I have opened large parts of my life to them. They have always been very respectful of me as an artiste who essentially retains the autonomy of the story that he is telling.”

Both the brothers bring fallen kites home and sometimes the number is around 30 a day. They provide medical attention to these kites and feed them, and till now, they have rescued over 24,000 birds. When did they start rescuing kites?

Mohammad Saud says, “When I was around 10-11 years old, I found a kite and I took it to a hospital behind Red Fort, but they refused to operate it as it is a meat-eating bird. I spent the whole day going from one hospital to the other, but everywhere I took the bird, they refused to operate. Shaam mein haar kar maine usse wahin rakh diya jahan se uthaya. Over the years, I kept seeing these birds dying on the road, but I never picked them again because I knew I would not be able to help them. In 2003, one day, I found a black kite and decided to do whatever I can on my own.”

Critics have praised the documentary for its intensity and telling the story as if the camera is not even in the room. Saud says, “Shaunak came to meet us in December 2018 and for the next three years it continued. Shaunak ne kaha tha jab aap camera se itne familiar ho jayenge ki aap camera ke samne yawn karne lagenge tab main apna pehla shot lunga.”

Mohammad Saud and Nadeem Shehzad also attended the screening at Cannes and Saud says, “It was a packed house, and we did not just get a long standing ovation, but people were crying in the theatres.”

Shaunak adds, “I think there is a quiet grace to trying something very hard and then getting the success that it is earned and justified.”

Delhi-based film director Shaunak Sen, a former student of Jamia Millia Islamia and JNU, received the prestigious L’OEil D’Or award, also known as The Golden Eye, for his poetic and environmentally-sensitive documentary, ‘All That Breathes’, at the Cannes Film Festival on Saturday.

The jury said, “L’OEil d’Or goes to a film that, in a world of destruction, reminds us that every life matters, and every small action matters. You can grab your camera, you can save a bird, you can hunt for some moments of stealing beauty, it matters. It’s an inspirational journey in observation of three Don Quixotes who may not save the whole world but do save their world.”

The award includes a cash prize of 5,000 euros.

Against the darkening backdrop of New Delhi’s apocalyptic air and escalating violence, Shaunak Sen’s ‘All That Breathes’, the film that bagged the Golden Eye Award at the Cannes Film Festival on Saturday, maps the lives of two brothers, Saud and Nadeem, who have devoted their lives to rescuing and treating the black kite from a rundown basement in Wazirabad.

“I am not interested in making either conventional ‘nature-based’ programming or a ‘wildlife’ documentary. My focus is neither limited to the life of the human protagonists nor the avian ones. The city itself – replete with the many human-animal ensembles in it – features in the film as a character,” the 34-year-old film director said in a director’s note put on the Cannes film festival website.

Earlier in January, the 88-minute documentary had received the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance International Film Festival. The film is dedicated to Sen’s father, who passed away following a stroke last July.

“In recent months, Nadeem and Saud have felt under siege from factors other than Delhi’s ongoing environmental catastrophe. The family grapples with the seismic ecological and political changes taking place around them and their relationship with their work comes under severe stress,” Sen further writes.

“The film experiences many of these macro-level changes through intimate details, as the family deals with them. Sometimes through trepidation, sometimes through instinctive fear, sometimes with wry humour, occasionally with ugly in-fighting, but mostly – with quiet courage,” he says.

Work on the film, which was edited in Denmark, began in 2019. In an earlier interview to The Times of India, Sen had explained the film germinated in his head. He spoke of “the grey hazy monotone laminates our life”, the “tiny dots” or black kites which glide on the city’s skies.