Naren: Saumyananda and I first met when we were in school, and I remember (it was) on the football field. We exchanged books and music and didn’t play football. Much later, we worked on a film where I was an EP (executive producer) and Saumyananda was an editor and cinematographer. When they developed the idea and were looking to apply somewhere, Saumyananda invited me and asked me if I’d like to be a producer. The thing that really resonated with me is the struggle around mental illness. What Saumyananda and Tanushree discussed right now is also something close to me, and something I’ve grown up seeing in my family. How these conversations are sometimes pushed under the carpet or relegated to the shadows. That’s the first thing that pulled and propelled me into the project, which was to understand why this conversation is in the shadows. Also how in the shadows, even if there wasn’t much understanding in a very explicit or specific way, there was so much love. I really love the idea of seeing love as a rebellion, but also love as a redemptive and powerful force that is spoken of in this very rosy way. However, sometimes love is resilience, and sometimes love is making very difficult choices that might seem counterintuitive but speak to a larger and more healing whole that you look forward to in the future, especially when considering a family. I saw healing in this story, and in this process of making it.Aman: We were, of course, familiar with Saumyananda and Tanushree’s work, with everything that they had done in independent cinema over the past decade. Saumyananda had worked with us on All That Breathes. The screenplay had everything that I think we would have expected from them. The molten code of the story was love in all its messiness, complexity, knottedness, the way in which it can both liberate you but also tie you down, the difficult decisions that must be taken. And all of it was happening through this very embedded, detailed character story. There’re so many things that the film touches on, whether it came comes to the labor that Maya carries out, physical, emotional; the whole idea of mental health, the stigma, the burdens and efforts and frustrations involved in the act of caregiving, and yet, all of these are being dealt with through this very gentle, nuanced touch, and through these characters. With Tillotama’s (Shome) performance, and as the rest of the team filled out, the film got more and more fleshed out, and more layers kept on getting added to it.
Source link
