Anurag Kashyap said India did not receive much attention at the Cannes Film Festival. He stressed that the recognition garnered by independent filmmakers at the prestigious event is solely their own achievement, as the government does not provide substantial support for such groundbreaking cinema.
During the 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival, India achieved a remarkable feat by clinching three prestigious awards. Payal Kapadia made history by becoming the first Indian director to win the Grand Prix for her film "All We Imagine As Light".
Anasuya Sengupta was honoured as the best actress in the Un Certain Regard category for her outstanding performance in "The Shameless".
FTII student Chidananda S. Naik also received the best short film award in the La Cinef section for his film "Sunflowers Were the First Ones to Know". These accomplishments showcased the talent and creativity of Indian filmmakers on the global stage.
“I get very upset when it's said 'India@Cannes'. This is a boost… a shot in the arm for a lot of independent filmmakers, but their victory is their own," Kashyap told PTI in an interview here.
“India didn't have any moment at Cannes, not a single of those films are Indian. We need to address it the way it should be addressed. India has stopped supporting such cinema, the kind of cinema that was at Cannes,” he said.
He mentioned that Kapadia's "All We Imagine as Light" was the first Indian film in 30 years to be featured in the main competition at Cannes. The film, known for providing a platform to new voices, received funding from a French company. This Malayalam-Hindi feature, which received the second-highest award at Cannes after the Palme d'Or, is a collaboration between Petit Chaos from France and Chalk and Cheese Films from India.
Several films at Cannes had stories set in India or Indian talent involved, most of which were co-productions with companies from other countries.
Indian-British filmmaker Sandhya Suri's “Santosh” and Karan Kandhari’s “Sister Midnight” were backed by the UK, while Konstantin Bojanov’s “The Shameless” was nearly self-financed. On the other hand, Chidanand's "Sunflowers..." is a production of the TV Wing One-year program at the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII).
“India just likes to take credit for a lot of things; they do not support these films, and they don’t even support these films to have a release in cinema,” Kashyap said.
In 2021, Kapadia won an award at Cannes for the documentary “A Night of Knowing Nothing,” but it has yet to be released in India.
"Stop taking credit for it. Let’s stop this fake celebration... Even if the film is released, no one will go to watch it in the theatre,” the 51-year-old said.
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