Canadian Premiere
Loosely inspired by people and events from director Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s life, the film follows an interconnected web of characters and the architecture of their lives. An agoraphobic recluse finds shelter in the derelict theatre inherited from his father, refusing the moneyed siren call of real estate developers and an ambitious young man finds a job in a chit fund without realizing the shady undercurrents of the financial world he’s in. At the centre is Ela, a TV host who strikes out for a new life in the wake of her daughter’s death and a floundering marriage. The Calcutta she navigates is, like herself, haunted by its past and unsure of its future.
Aditya Vikram Sengupta, working alongside Turkish cinematographer Gökhan Tiryaki (Winter Sleep) finds a lyrical atmosphere, exploring the depths and vagaries of the human condition against the backdrop of a crumbling, nostalgia-mired city in the midst of urban development and cultural upheaval.
Community Partner
Sreelekha Mitra, Satrajit Sarkar, Arindam Ghosh, Shayak Roy, Bratya Basu, Anirban Chakrabarti
India/France/Norway
2021
In Bengali with English subtitles
Book Tickets
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
The Sun Never Sets
At the suggestion of her much older (divorced) boyfriend, Wendy (Dakota Fanning) takes a summer to reevaluate her life and date other people. She's reluctant at first, but then reconnects with an old flame... A gentle indie comedy from Joe Swanberg.
Hanging by a Wire
The Himalayas, Aug 22, 2023: a cable car bearing 8 passengers (six of them schoolkids) is left dangling 900 feet above the ground when two out of three cables snap. This nailbiting documentary recounts the increasingly frantic rescue attempts.
A Sad and Beautiful World
This Lebanese love story chronicles the romance between a level-headed businesswoman and a romantic restauranteur across several decades in wartorn Beirut. It's funny, charming, melancholy and you'll feel it all.
September Songs: The Music of Kurt Weill + Q&A
In the early 1990s, director Larry Weinstein and music producer Hal Wilner brought together an extraordinary line up of performers to pay tribute to the great German composer Kurt Weill, among them Nick Cave, Lou Reed, PJ Harvey and Elvis Costello.
Union County
In this authentically grounded addiction recovery drama, Will Poulter and Noah Centenio are foster brothers trying to get out from their dependence on opioids through a progressive government program in Ohio.
Late Fame
Based on a novella by Arthur Schnitzler (Eyes Wide Shut) this is a sly, poignant comedy about vanity and art from director Kent Jones, starring Willem Dafoe as a mailman belatedly acclaimed for a book of poetry he wrote in his youth.
Credits
Executive Producer
Aditya Vikram Sengupta, Jonaki Bhattacharya
Producer
Priyanka Agarwal, Anshulika Dubey, Shashwat Singh, Vikram Mohinta
Screenwriter
Aditya Vikram Sengupta
Cinematography
Gökhan Tiryaki
Editor
Aditya Vikram Sengupta
Production Design
Jonaki Bhattacharya
Original Music
Minco Eggersman
Director
Aditya Vikram Sengupta
Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s debut film Labour of Love (2014) premiered at the Venice Film Festival, where it won the Fedeora Award for Best Director of a Debut Film. His second feature Jonaki (2018) premiered at the International Film Festival Rotterdam. It went on to receive the Silver Gateway Award and the Best Film on Gender Equality at the Mumbai Film Festival. Sengupta’s next film Once Upon a Time in Calcutta (2021) was the first Bengali language feature to be a part of Cannes Cinéfondation’s L’Atelier at the Cannes Film Festival in 2016.
Filmography: Labour of Love (2014); Jonaki (2018)