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All We Imagine as Light is the first Indian film to win the Grand Prix at Cannes, beating its big budget competitors Kinds of Kindness and Megalopolis. Directed by Payal Kapadia, this is her fiction feature debut. Following two nurses from Kerala and their colleague working in a Mumbai hospital, the film juxtaposes the bright lights and promises of the city with the stark reality of the women’s lives. It’s modern India as Western audiences have never seen it. It was shortlisted but not selected as India’s international Oscar submission, because the Indian jury “felt they were watching a European film taking place in India, not an Indian film taking place in Europe”. It’s disheartening that Indian cinema believes a film about the modern lives of women in Mumbai is less Indian than a marital comedy of errors.
Selected cinemas 23 November, general release 29 November
