Folklore, feminism and film noir come together in Pushpendra Singh’s meticulously crafted fourth feature “The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs.” Set in the disputed Jammu and Kashmir region in Northwest India, this moody fable about an unhappy young bride plotting her escape from tradition and patriarchy is a gripping character study that stutters slightly in the latter stages before producing a magical finale that no-one will forget in a hurry. Singh’s beautifully shot film has traveled extensively on the festival circuit and picked up awards at Hong Kong and Jeonju since debuting at Berlin in 2020. Specialty distributor partners Deaf Crocodile Films and Gratitude Films have acquired the film for U.S. release.
Singh’s penetrating study of toxic patriarchy and female identity is based on a short story by Vijayadan Detha, the acclaimed Rajasthani author known for bringing modern and often provocative sensibilities to folk tales. Singh previously...
Singh’s penetrating study of toxic patriarchy and female identity is based on a short story by Vijayadan Detha, the acclaimed Rajasthani author known for bringing modern and often provocative sensibilities to folk tales. Singh previously...
- 3/1/2022
- by Richard Kuipers
- Variety Film + TV
The Kashmir region is defined by it beauty and the many cultures its conveys. However, its territory also highlights the troubled history of India after the partition when Kashmir became the most fought-over region, resulting in three wars between Pakistan and India, and the region finally being subdivided among the two states, as well as China. Its history as well as its rich culture is what attracted Indian director Pushpendra Singh for his third feature “The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs” whose story is set within the Indian-administered territories of Jammu and Kashmir. The movie, which had its world premiere at the 2020 Berlin International Film Festival, tells a story about the region, but also one about oppression and liberation, about desire and attraction.
“The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs” lands on digital and video-on-demand March 15, 2022 in North America from Deaf Crocodile Films and Gratitude Films, collaborating with digital partner Grasshopper Films.
“The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs” lands on digital and video-on-demand March 15, 2022 in North America from Deaf Crocodile Films and Gratitude Films, collaborating with digital partner Grasshopper Films.
- 2/20/2022
- by Rouven Linnarz
- AsianMoviePulse
One of the most beautiful films I’ve seen in the last few years, Pushpendra Singh’s The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs is finally getting a U.S. theatrical release next month. A selection at Berlinale and New Directors/New Films, the drama will come to The Museum of Modern Art, courtesy of Deaf Crocodile Films and theatrical partner Gratitude Films, beginning on January 12th, 2022 for a week-long run, followed by a spring 2022 VOD release, with support from Grasshopper Film.
The fourth feature from Singh is the second of their works adapting celebrated Rajasthani writer Vidaydan Detha, while also taking great inspiration from 14th-century Indian folklore. Divided into seven separate sections, each structured around a unique song that acts as insight into the protagonist’s inner world, the film follows a young bride, Laila (Navjot Randhawa), who marries into a tribe of nomadic Bakarwal herders. Already harassed by local police as a minority,...
The fourth feature from Singh is the second of their works adapting celebrated Rajasthani writer Vidaydan Detha, while also taking great inspiration from 14th-century Indian folklore. Divided into seven separate sections, each structured around a unique song that acts as insight into the protagonist’s inner world, the film follows a young bride, Laila (Navjot Randhawa), who marries into a tribe of nomadic Bakarwal herders. Already harassed by local police as a minority,...
- 12/17/2021
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
The Kashmir region is defined by it beauty and the many cultures its conveys. However, its territory also highlights the troubled history of India after the partition when Kashmir became the most fought-over region, resulting in three wars between Pakistan and India, and the region finally being subdivided among the two states, as well as China. Its history as well as its rich culture is what attracted Indian director Pushpendra Singh for his third feature “The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs” whose story is set within the Indian-administered territories of Jammu and Kashmir. The movie, which had its world premiere at the 2020 Berlin International Film Festival, tells a story about the region, but also one about oppression and liberation, about desire and attraction.
The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs is screening at Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles
Upon their travels through the Kashmir territory, shepherd Tanvir (Saddakit Bijran) is...
The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs is screening at Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles
Upon their travels through the Kashmir territory, shepherd Tanvir (Saddakit Bijran) is...
- 5/21/2021
- by Rouven Linnarz
- AsianMoviePulse
Northwest India’s Jammu and Kashmir region resides at the center of a longstanding geopolitical stalemate involving neighboring Pakistan. While those tensions are referenced in The Shepherdess and the Seven Songs, they are not the film’s focal point. Instead, paranoia and opportunism have become fully ingrained in the forest area’s mountainous bedrock. Of more importance is why these characters either accept or subvert such societal realities, and how they normalize modes of corruption and gender inequality under the guise of tradition or progress.
When split in half, the title of Pushpendra Singh’s riveting character study represents competing forces of assimilation and freedom, patriarchy and artistic expression. Laila (Navjot Randhawa), who comes by her occupation not out of choice but an arranged marriage to the shepherd Tanvir (Sadakkit Bijran), embodies this strain wholeheartedly. To make sense of the suffocation felt as an independent woman in spirit and kept bride in practice,...
When split in half, the title of Pushpendra Singh’s riveting character study represents competing forces of assimilation and freedom, patriarchy and artistic expression. Laila (Navjot Randhawa), who comes by her occupation not out of choice but an arranged marriage to the shepherd Tanvir (Sadakkit Bijran), embodies this strain wholeheartedly. To make sense of the suffocation felt as an independent woman in spirit and kept bride in practice,...
- 12/10/2020
- by Glenn Heath Jr.
- The Film Stage
In the vast and gorgeous region of Kashmir (which most outsiders might only associate with its contestation between India and Pakistan), nomadic tribes still live difficult but not unpleasant lives, herding their animals beneath the beauty and drama of the Himalayas. Though their existence is under constant threat of the increasing and generally useless bureaucracy and scrutiny of civil servants and police. Magic still exists in these forests and mountains; Pushpendra Singh’s luscious tale The Shephardess and the Seven Songs, inspired by poetry by 14th century mystic Lalleshwari and an old folktale, infuses this magic to the modern world as one particular woman struggles for independence of body, mind, and spirit. It seems that Laila (Navjot Randhawa) has no choice but to marry Tanvir (Sadakkit...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 10/19/2020
- Screen Anarchy
India’s representative at this year’s (virtual) Fantasia International Film Festival was Kriya, written and directed by Sidharth Srinivasan. At a nightclub party, the DJ, a young man named Neel (Noble Luke), ends up hooking up with a girl, who eventually invites him to her house. Soon enough, what seemed like a regular, fun night, turns into something else. Neel finds out that Sitara’s relatives –including her mother Tara Devi (Avantika Akerkar), her younger sister Sara (Kanak Bhardwaj), a friend of the family and their housemaid Magdali (Anuradha Majumder) – are congregated for the patriarch’s last rites. Our protagonist knows something is wrong. Sitara appears to have her own agenda, much like her mother, which makes us...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 9/8/2020
- Screen Anarchy
It's a hot night in the club, bodies packed close together, lights a blur of colour. DJ Neel (Noble Luke) keeps the music pulsing but is eager to get onto the dancefloor himself, to share in the mood, especially when the glamorous, alluring Sitara (Navjot Randhawa) starts moving his way. There's something hypnotic about the atmosphere on a night like this. Both their bodies respond to it, moving in time; and when the night is over they're outside, in a car, tangled together. only at the last minute does she pull back.
"I thought you wanted to!" he protests.
"Yes," she says, "but not here."
If you're an aficionado of horror films like the viewers who saw this at Fantasia 2020, you'll realise that agreeing to go back to her place could be a very bad move on Neel's part - but events are about to get a lot stranger.
For a start,...
"I thought you wanted to!" he protests.
"Yes," she says, "but not here."
If you're an aficionado of horror films like the viewers who saw this at Fantasia 2020, you'll realise that agreeing to go back to her place could be a very bad move on Neel's part - but events are about to get a lot stranger.
For a start,...
- 9/4/2020
- by Jennie Kermode
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Religious horror, whether we speak about classics such as William Friedkin’s “The Exorcist” or more recent examples like Keith Thomas’ “The Vigil”, hold an interesting premise by definition. The idea that out of the everlasting battle between good and evil or that faith can bring forth monsters able to destroy a family, is quite intriguing to say the least, shedding light on the nature of faith, but also on the relationship of faith, family and modernity. With regard to his most recent directorial effort “Kriya” writer and filmmaker Sidharth Srinivasan (“Soul of Sand”) explains how the story “was born out of an acutely personal reaction to what was happening in my country, where Hindu fundamentalism and chauvinistic religious persecution were ripping India apart”. Thus, “Kriya” becomes a story about the problematic notion of religion being an extension of images of gender and patriarchy as well as a feature which,...
- 8/27/2020
- by Rouven Linnarz
- AsianMoviePulse
In Kriya Neel, a club DJ, meets the beautiful Sitara at a gig and is utterly transfixed by her. What starts under the pretense of a romantic fling becomes something much more disturbing when Sitara takes Neel home and reveals that her father is at Death’s door and the family is deep into ritualistic grieving. Neel tries many times to leave the house but is constantly pulled back in by Sitara’s seduction. Before long, it’s clear that there’s no escaping the inevitable and Neel is consumed by this cycle of grief and tradition.
Kriya is written and directed by Sidharth Srinivasan, in his first ever horror film and first narrative feature in a decade. Srinivasan’s inspiration for Kriya comes from his ever-present criticism and response to what he views as harmful religious fundamentalism and toxic patriarchy. The film stars Noble Luke and Navjot Randhawa and...
Kriya is written and directed by Sidharth Srinivasan, in his first ever horror film and first narrative feature in a decade. Srinivasan’s inspiration for Kriya comes from his ever-present criticism and response to what he views as harmful religious fundamentalism and toxic patriarchy. The film stars Noble Luke and Navjot Randhawa and...
- 8/27/2020
- by Caitlin Kennedy
- DailyDead
Stars: Noble Luke, Navjot Randhawa, Avantika Akerkar, M.D. Asif, Kishan Bahurupiya, Kanak Bhardwaj, Anuradha Majumder, Tapesh Sharma, Narender Sihag | Written and Directed by Sidharth Srinivasan
New Dheli writer and director Sidharth Srinivasan (Soul of Sand) brings us Kriya, a nightmarish Hindi-indie horror with fantastical and magical elements. There’s a surrealist tone at the epicentre of Kriya, one that drives the whole film forth with gusto and a remarkable freshness, making this film something unlike anything I’ve ever really seen before.
The story here isn’t necessarily one that rolls off the tongue in explanation. It’s, in a nutshell, a tale of a guy who meets a girl named Sitara in a nightclub and becomes immediately besotted with her, entranced and transfixed by her, but there’s more to this seductive beauty than our initial meeting would cause us to think. When they head back to Sitara’s place,...
New Dheli writer and director Sidharth Srinivasan (Soul of Sand) brings us Kriya, a nightmarish Hindi-indie horror with fantastical and magical elements. There’s a surrealist tone at the epicentre of Kriya, one that drives the whole film forth with gusto and a remarkable freshness, making this film something unlike anything I’ve ever really seen before.
The story here isn’t necessarily one that rolls off the tongue in explanation. It’s, in a nutshell, a tale of a guy who meets a girl named Sitara in a nightclub and becomes immediately besotted with her, entranced and transfixed by her, but there’s more to this seductive beauty than our initial meeting would cause us to think. When they head back to Sitara’s place,...
- 8/26/2020
- by Chris Cummings
- Nerdly
The Fantasia International Film Festival will be celebrating its 24th edition as a virtual event accessible to movie lovers across Canada, with a wild assortment of scheduled screenings, panels, and workshops taking place online from August 20 through September 2, 2020. The decision to launch a digital edition of the famed genre festival was born from Fantasia’s desire to keep the health and safety of its attendees a top priority during the current global health crisis, while still offering daring, much-needed new genre entertainment to residents of Canada and supporting the breakout filmmakers of the year.
The festival’s full lineup will be announced in early August. In the meantime, Fantasia is excited to reveal a selected first wave of titles.
Makoto Tezuka adapts the legendary manga “Tezuka’s Barbara”!
One night, a famous novelist encounters a young, seemingly homeless woman in an overpass tunnel. He brings her home, which sets him...
The festival’s full lineup will be announced in early August. In the meantime, Fantasia is excited to reveal a selected first wave of titles.
Makoto Tezuka adapts the legendary manga “Tezuka’s Barbara”!
One night, a famous novelist encounters a young, seemingly homeless woman in an overpass tunnel. He brings her home, which sets him...
- 6/12/2020
- by Rouven Linnarz
- AsianMoviePulse
The 70th Berlin International Film Festival (Feb 20 – March 1) unveiled its Encounters program today, featuring the premieres of new works by Tim Sutton and Romanian director Cristi Puiu.
Also screening is Josephine Decker’s Shirley with Elisabeth Moss and Michael Stuhlbarg, marking the film’s international premiere after its upcoming Sundance bow, and Gunda by Victor Kossakovsky, whose last pic was the 2018 Venice doc Aquarela.
Encounters is a newly-created competitive section at the Berlin festival that looks to highlight “new voices in cinema and to give more room to diverse narrative and documentary forms.” A three-member jury will choose the winners for Best Film, Best Director and a Special Jury Award.
“As a result of passionate research, the 15 titles chosen for Encounters present the vitality of cinema in all of its forms. Each film presents a different way of interpreting the cinematic story: autobiographical, intimate, political,...
Also screening is Josephine Decker’s Shirley with Elisabeth Moss and Michael Stuhlbarg, marking the film’s international premiere after its upcoming Sundance bow, and Gunda by Victor Kossakovsky, whose last pic was the 2018 Venice doc Aquarela.
Encounters is a newly-created competitive section at the Berlin festival that looks to highlight “new voices in cinema and to give more room to diverse narrative and documentary forms.” A three-member jury will choose the winners for Best Film, Best Director and a Special Jury Award.
“As a result of passionate research, the 15 titles chosen for Encounters present the vitality of cinema in all of its forms. Each film presents a different way of interpreting the cinematic story: autobiographical, intimate, political,...
- 1/17/2020
- by Tom Grater
- Deadline Film + TV
In my dealings with Asian cinema, I have seen a number of strange, extreme and experimental films, but I have to admit “Mehsampur” left me quite perplexed, regarding both its nature (an experimental mockumentary one could say if the basic premise was not a real event) and its quality. Let us take things from the beginning though.
“Mehsampur” runs as part of the 9th edition of the Bagri Foundation London Indian Film Festival, that runs at 15 cinemas, across London, Birmingham and Manchester, from 21st June to 1st July, with 27 films, including features and short films, in competition. It is the largest South Asian film festival in Europe. Buy your tickets via this website, at respective cinema box offices: http://londonindianfilmfestival.co.uk/
The film functions as a very strange documentary, that has an eccentric filmmaker named Devrath arriving to Punjab to make a movie about the popular folk-singing duo Amar Singh Chamkila...
“Mehsampur” runs as part of the 9th edition of the Bagri Foundation London Indian Film Festival, that runs at 15 cinemas, across London, Birmingham and Manchester, from 21st June to 1st July, with 27 films, including features and short films, in competition. It is the largest South Asian film festival in Europe. Buy your tickets via this website, at respective cinema box offices: http://londonindianfilmfestival.co.uk/
The film functions as a very strange documentary, that has an eccentric filmmaker named Devrath arriving to Punjab to make a movie about the popular folk-singing duo Amar Singh Chamkila...
- 6/18/2018
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
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