It is not often that short films screened at the International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala (IDSFFK) gets a second screening. Gul directed by Saurabh Sachdeva has been talked about much ever since it was premiered on the second day of the festival. The film got a second screening on Monday, with yet another packed crowd applauding it.
The popularity of the film seems to have much to do with the twist in the end, which becomes a sad commentary on contemporary society.
“We were just brainstorming and my co-writer Abhash Makharia suggested this idea which he got from an article that appeared in magazine. It was about a brother and sister who were forcibly married because they were sitting together in a park on Valentine’s Day. Then we got a video also of that incident. We felt that we had to make a movie out of this. Nobody has a right to dictate to you what the right kind of love is,” says Sachdeva.
But instead of using story straight for the short film, it is beautifully pegged at the end of a narrative which depicts the daily struggles of Ajay, a garland maker and his sister Mamta, a mehndi artist. The sister is suffering from an illness which has caused her to go partly bald, which is a constant worry for the brother.
It juxtaposes the cultural policing of the right wing forces with the daily struggles for food and shelter of the majority. Seen in that light, the thugs who try to impose their narrow world views appear more caricature-ish. “Yes, the larger politics happening right now in the country has certainly influenced the way I made the film,” he says. Sachdeva is an acting coach at the Barry John Acting Studio in Mumbai since 2002. He has also directed several plays in the past 14 years, an experience which might have helped in eliciting raw and affecting performances from his cast. He is currently working on a feature film. “For the past 7-8 months, we have been travelling to Vrindavan, to the ashram of the widows. Our film is about three people who are travelling to find their self and end up in this ashram,” he says.
