• Indian filmmaker Payal Kapadia’s ‘All We Imagine As Light’ becomes the first Indian title in 30 years to feature in the prestigious Competition section of the Cannes Film Festival, where it will vie for the top prize Palme d’Or.

• British-Indian filmmaker Sandhya Suri’s ‘Santosh’ will also be showcased at the 77th edition of the film festival. The movie will be screened under the ‘Un Certain Regard’ section.

• Kapadia’s ‘All We Imagine As Light’ will be presented under the main segment alongside 19 other highly anticipated titles, including films from master directors Francis Ford Coppola (‘Megalopolis’) and Yorgos Lanthimos (‘Kinds of Kindness’).

• ‘Oh Canada’ by Paul Schrader, ‘Bird’ by Andrea Arnold, ‘The Shrouds’ by David Cronenberg, and ‘Anora’ by Sean Baker are also part of the main Competition slate.

• Kapadia, an alumna of the Film & Television Institute of India (FTII), is best known for her acclaimed documentary ‘A Night of Knowing Nothing’, which premiered at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival’s Director’s Fortnight side-bar where it won the Oeil d’or (Golden Eye) award.

• ‘All We Imagine As Light’, also written by Kapadia, marks her narrative feature debut.

• The last Indian film to compete for the Palme d’or was the 1994 film Swaham directed by Shaji N. Karun. 

• Before that, films like Mrinal Sen’s Genesis (1986) and Satyajit Ray’s Ghare Baire (1984) were selected in the segment.

• Some other Indian films selected for Cannes Competition segment include: Mrinal Sen’s ‘Kharij’ (1983), M.S. Sathyu’s ‘Garm Hava’ (1974), Satyajit Ray’s ‘Parash Pathar’ (1958), Raj Kapoor’s ‘Awaara’ (1953), V. Shantaram’s ‘Amar Bhoopali’ (1952) and Chetan Anand’s ‘Neecha Nagar’ (1946).

• ‘Neecha Nagar’ is the only Indian film ever to win the top honour at Cannes back in 1946. At the time, the award was known as Grand Prix du Festival International du Film. 

• Suri’s ‘Santosh’ will compete alongside 14 other movies in the Un Certain Regard, which runs parallel to the main competition. 

• The Hindi-language film, a character-driven neo-noir story set in the hinterlands of north India, is a UK-European co-production and stars Shahana Goswami.

• Quentin Dupieux’s ‘The Second Act’ is the opening film at the festival on May 14.

Cannes Film Festival

• The Cannes Film Festival is one of the most prestigious events in the world of cinema. 

• It takes place for two weeks in May every year, in the town of Cannes in France.

• The first edition of the film festival was held in 1946.

• The films selected for the official competition are screened before a jury composed of famous names from the world of cinema. The jury awards prizes in various categories, including the Palme d’Or, the Grand Prize, the Jury Prize and the Best Director Prize.

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