HOME's annual celebration of contemporary Indian culture, Not Just Bollywood, will return for a third year and will reflect HOME's ongoing Celebrating Women in Global Cinema season with the programme devoted to films directed by women. Curated by UK-based film scholar, Omar Ahmed and HOME's Head of Film Rachel Hayward, the 2019 programme is presented in partnership with much-loved Bombay café, Dishoom, who will also present an Indian cookery workshop as part of the season's special events programme.
Kicking off the season on 11 September, is the first film in Deepa Mehta’s controversial 'Elements' trilogy, a body of work exploring homosexuality in contemporary India (Fire, 1996), the horrors of Partition (Earth, 1998), and religion (Water, 2005). Rarely screened before in the UK, the trilogy highlights the work of two of Indian cinema’s most politically engaged women filmmakers - director Deepa Mehta and prolific actor-director Nandita Das (Manto, Firaaq) who stars in both Fire and Earth.
Reflecting the increasing prominence of women filmmakers in independent Indian cinema, the 2019 programme also includes three debut features. Konkona Sen Sharma's A Death in the Gunj (2016) is a critically acclaimed period piece featuring an ensemble cast of some of India's most well-respected actors, including Ranvir Shorey, Tillotama Shome, Kalki Koechlin and Om Puri. Rohena Gera's Sir (2018) is a contemporary urban fairy tale set in Mumbai, while Anu Menon’s Waiting (2015), shot in the historic coastal city of Kochi, offers a philosophical commentary on death, love and social media. Spectacular locations are also on display in Ukrainian-born Dar Gai's second feature, Namdev Bhau in Search of Silence (2018), which follows an old Mumbai man as he journeys to Silent Valley in the high Himalayas on a mission to find some peace and quiet.
The award-winning and critically acclaimed Lipstick Under My Burkha (2016) from Alankrita Shrivastava, one of India's leading contemporary writer-directors, will screen on 21 September. Initially banned by the censors in India, the film, about four small-town Indian women, is a timely exploration of sexual desire, resistance and patriarchal oppression. Season co-curator Omar Ahmed cites Shrivastava's film along with Waiting and Sir, as examples of an ongoing wave of films that celebrate the emergence of the "New Woman" in contemporary India, a topic that will be discussed in a special One Hour Intro event on 28 September - "The New Woman and Contemporary Indian Cinema." The University of Warwick's Dr Saba Hussain will lead an illustrated talk about the impact of the #MeToo movement on Indian society and cinema, linking this to the rise of on-screen resistance and the growing power of the female audience at the Indian box office.
