Love, Interrupted

National Award-winning film Kamuki facets of modern relationships

THE TROUBLED ending of a personal relationship inspired 28-year-old filmmaker Christo Tomy to think about the social and gender politics that accompany the end of a love affair. He set out to capture the many dimensions of modern-day relationships in his film, Kamuki, which won the National Award for Best Non-feature Film Direction this year.

Kamuki tells the story of a 17-year-old girl, Divya, who belongs to a conservative Malayali family and lives in Kolkata. When she finds out that she is pregnant, Divya sets out to search for her boyfriend with whom she had broken up a month back. “My film explores how people today deal with breakups, which is very different from the way the previous generations did,” says the Kerala-based director, who also drew inspiration from real-life experiences of close friends. The film was screened at the BRICS Film Festival in Delhi, in the non-competition category.

Krishna Padmakumar, winner of the Kerala State Film Award in the “best child artist” category for Janaki (2010), plays the lead role. She portrays Divya’s ordeal as she searches for her former boyfriend, with sensitivity and maturity. The film was Tomy’s final diploma film as a student of Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute, Kolkata.

Kamuki, which means female lover, captures the dichotomy of the modern world in which youngsters have many social media relationships but not real ones. This drives them into relationships to escape their loneliness and they face the danger of losing a sense of balance once the affair ends.

Divya has an ill mother and a domineering father, and no friends. “The film is not just about the Malayali society; other communities face similar situations,” says Tomy, who has assisted veteran filmmaker Adoor Gopalakrishnan in his latest film Pinneyum. In the last scene of Kamuki, Divya deletes the videos of her with her lover and begins the journey towards rejuvenation.