Imagine BIG
Kani Kustruti on the Cannes selection for her forthcoming lm directed by Payal Kapadia
Kani Kusruti was under the weather, bracing for another work trip to Kerala when the news broke. Her forthcoming lm, Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine as Light, had been selected in competition at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. It is the rst time in 30 years that an Indian lm will be vying for the prestigious Palme d’Or.
“I was at home in Goa, where I currently live, when the messages started pouring in,” Kani says. “I was busy packing for a shoot in Kerala, and a little tired and sick, or else I would’ve responded to each text.”
All We Imagine...’s selection marks a big occasion for Indian cinema. The country has, in recent years, risen in CM
YKpro le and visibility at Cannes. Yet, despite lms like Masaan and All That Breathes bringing home top honours, we have rarely basked in main competition glory. The only Indian
lm to ever win the Palme d’Or — then known as Grand Prix du Festival International du Film — is Chetan Anand’s Neecha Nagar (1946). Satyajit Ray and Mrinal Sen’s lms were tfully nominated, with Sen’s 1982 domestic help drama Kharij winning the Jury Prize. In 1994, Malayalam director
Shaji N Karun’s rural-set classic Swaham was the last lm from India to compete for the Palme d’Or.
Serendipitously, All We Imagine as Light is the story of two Kerala nurses working in Mumbai, and both its leads, Kani and Ariyippu actor Divya Prabha, are Malayalis. In all, it has been an ecstatic few weeks for Kerala
lm fans, with the tidings from Cannes and movies like Manjummel Boys, Aadujeevitham and Aavesham breaking out wide.
“I feel the more regional the treatment of a lm is, the more it speaks an international language,” observes Kani, who remembers watching Swaham in a theatre as a child.
In All We Imagine as Light, Kani plays Prabha, the head nurse at a Mumbai hospital. She rooms with Anu, another nurse, who is younger. Prabha is estranged from her husband, while Anu is seeking privacy in the big city with her boyfriend. “One day, the two nurses go on a road trip to a beach town where the mystical forest becomes a space for their dreams to manifest,” reads a plotline.
Kani says she was initially approached by Payal to play the younger nurse. But the project took years to get o the ground, and she winded up with the role of Prabha.
“Prabha is not someone I relate to,” Kani states. “She is someone who carries a lot of baggage due to social expectations. Although she has found economic independence, her conscience is torn between her desires and what others want her to do.”
Kani is a rockstar on the Indian indie circuit. Her 2020 Malayalam
lm Biriyaani won a host of awards; more recently, her lm Girls Will Be Girls premiered at Sundance. She has an equally proli c streaming career; this year alone, she has featured in high-pro le shows like Killer Soup, Poacher and Maharani Season 3. So it is a surprise when she admits that, circumstances permitting, she avoids attending jazzy festival premieres or red carpets. “I get easily overwhelmed in crowds,” she laughs.
Will she attend Cannes, though? “I am shooting on those days. If it’s possible, I will go. I understand it’s a humongous deal, India competing at Cannes and all that. But more than anything, I would want to watch this
lm with the entire cast and crew that worked on it. The joy of creating something special together is still alive.”
Payal Kapadia’s documentary, A Night of Knowing Nothing (2021), won the Golden Eye at Cannes. Before that, her student short, Afternoon Clouds (2017), was selected in the cinéfondation category at the fest