Payal Kapadia’s ‘All We Imagine As Light’, The First Indian Film In The Cannes Competition In 30 Years, Gets 8-Minute Ovation Following World Premiere

Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light landed a hearty eight minute standing ovation following its debut this evening at the Cannes Film Festival.

The pic, which screened in the late night competition slot this evening in Cannes, is Kapadia’s debut fiction feature. The pic also made history this evening. Kapadia is the first female Indian filmmaker to screen a movie in the Cannes competition. At the same time, her film is the first Indian production in competition in three decades.

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Shot over 25 late summer days in Mumbai, followed by an extra 15 in the rainy western port town of Ratnagiri, the Malayalam-Hindi language feature tells the story of two young women — Prabha, a nurse from Mumbai, and Anu, her roommate. The story opens as Prabha’s daily routine is broken when she receives an unexpected gift from her estranged husband. Meanwhile, Anu tries in vain to find a spot in the city to be intimate with her boyfriend. A trip to a beach town allows them to find a space for their desires to manifest.

A rare French-Indo co-production, the film is a collaboration between the Paris-based producers Thomas Hakim and Julien Graff, of Petit Chaos, and Zico Maitra of Chalk & Cheese Films out of Mumbai.

Kapadia is best known internationally for her feature doc A Night of Knowing Nothing (2021), which screened in Director’s Fortnight, where it won the Golden Eye for best documentary.

Kapadia and her producer, Thomas Hakim, stopped by our studio in Cannes where they discussed their unique collaboration and how they feel about making history this year in Cannes.

“India is a country that makes a lot of good films. Not just Bollywood but every state has its industry and there are absolutely brilliant filmmakers,” Kapadia told us. “I hope that after this we won’t have to wait another 30 years.” Check out the full interview here.

The Cannes Film Festival ends Saturday.

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