all we imagine as light: This time the 77th Cannes Film Festival was very special for Indians, because Payal Kapadia directed film 'All We Imagine as Light' created history by winning the Grand Prix Award. Actually, after 30 years an Indian film got this opportunity. At the same time, Payal is the first Indian female director, whose film was screened in this category at Cannes. This film has been released in theaters on 22 November. Key excerpts from Payal Kapadia's conversation with Urmila Kori on the journey from the making of this film to reaching the Cannes Film Festival.

We had a party as soon as we heard the news of going to the competition.

At the beginning of the 77th Cannes Film Festival, I was told that my film would be shown in a different section. To be honest, I was very happy to hear this. Suddenly, on the day the press conference was to be held, I get an email in the evening saying that we are putting your film in the competition. I would like to tell as soon as our film went into competition. We were so happy that we all went and started partying. That we would win the award was not in my mind. I think we filmmakers think less about winning.

The idea of making a film came while going to and from the hospital.

My father is very old. My father is suffering from dementia, so we often go to the hospital. Dementia is a disease in which you do not need emergency treatment, rather it takes a long process. I have spent a lot of my time in hospital waiting rooms. Another close relative of mine was in the hospital, due to which I kept going to the hospital. During this time, I had made very good friends with the nurses, so you can say that I have spent a lot of my time in the hospital, due to which the idea for this story might have come to me. I felt I could say a lot more by connecting the nurse and the hospital.

A 90 year old nun has given piano music in the film

Piano and guitar have been used the most in the background music of our film. When Anu and Riyaz's love story comes in the film, the piano plays more. It reflects their romance somewhere. That piano composition was done by a nun from Ethiopia. His name was Emahe Sebru. She was 90 years old and died last year. The producer of my film is French and he was the one who told me about him. When I met him and heard his composition, I really felt that it was the right choice.

Artificial rain had to be made even during monsoon.

For the first time in the year 2018, I wrote a synopsis of the story of this film on the page. After that I made another film. After four years in 2022, I started working on this film again. this year
I did the entire pre-production of it. We shot in the next year 2023 and our film came to you in the next year 2024. This seems easy to put into words, but it did not happen. Film making is something that teaches us many lessons. A few days before the shooting, the hospital where we were going to shoot. they refused. After this we built the set and shot. Making the set had its own struggles. The day we needed rain for the film. There was no rain that day. When rain was not required in the scene, it was raining. We were shooting in Mumbai during the monsoon season by making artificial rain. People were laughing at us. One day during our Ratnagiri shooting schedule, a cobra came to the set. My French producer had never seen a snake in his life and he jumped when he saw a cobra. After this we had to call a snake catcher. Most of our actors were shooting barefoot.

Only women were on the set during the shooting of the intimate scene.

Being a woman director, I appeal to everyone and will also try to create a good work culture where women can feel very safe and secure. We will have to work continuously on this, because it is not going to happen in a day. If I talk about my film, there is a scene of intimacy at one place in the film. There were only ladies on the set during its shooting. I also used an intimate coordinator while shooting the scene. Our intimate coordinator was also an actor. He knew where to make the actress more comfortable.

Very happy to release in theaters

I am very happy with the support that I have started getting in India for my film. Now we have our distributor. It is a big deal for an independent film to get distribution, otherwise such films go only on OTT platforms. But my film has been released in theatres. I love theater very much, so I want to see my films on the big screen. Our film has also been passed by the censor without any cuts.