The Indian Film Festival of Melbourne has completed the much-anticipated filming of the first of four films in the My Melbourne project. Onir and William Duan co-direct the picture, which has yet to be named. Arka Das, Mouli Ganguli, and Jackson Gallagher star. The film was shot in five days and is about grief and forgiveness. After many years of estrangement, a queer Indian man, Indraneel, portrayed by Arka, and his father, Mihir, played by Mouli, reunite.
The filmmaker Onir stated, “I am delighted to be a part of My Melbourne because it is a one-of-a-kind special film. It is the first time that such a unique cross-country endeavour to build cultural links and bring the two communities together has been undertaken. My Melbourne films are centred on diversity and are focused on bringing forth talent from Melbourne. And I can attest that there are so many wonderful local talents waiting to be recognised, which this project has done. My video offers one such story of a vital component of diversity, telling the loving story of a father attempting to reconnect with his gay son. Working and collaborating with Melbourne talent was a fantastic experience. I am grateful to Film Victoria and Mitu Bhowmick Lange for taking this effort to promote cinema and diversity.”
My Melbourne project:
The festival director Mitu Bhowmik Lange comments, “This is a very ambitious project of love celebrating the core values of IFFM – diversity and inclusivity. The main aim was to give budding creatives from diverse disenfranchised backgrounds from various walks of life and skills in Australia a platform to be taught by some of the world’s top filmmakers. My Melbourne is an anthology of four stories woven into one feature film based on actual migration experiences. “What we cannot see, we cannot be.”
IFFM is one of the largest film festivals in the world, and it is sponsored by the Australian government. My Melbourne project invites four legendary Indian filmmakers to Australia to train emerging Australian filmmakers on the subjects of diversity – race, disability, sexuality, and gender. The other three films will be directed by Kabir Khan, Imtiaz Ali, and Rima Das, in addition to Onir.
