Adil Hussain-starrer
short film
, Meal, is being lapped up by whoever happens to watch it and how? It’s now the only Indian entry at the prestigious Oscar-qualifying 44th Odense International Film Festival 2019, Denmark. So, for the director of the short, Abhiroop Basu, it’s great news one after the other. “The selection at Odense triumphs everything that I have done so far. I was getting deeply frustrated after a lot of rejections from top festivals. I really rooted for
Meal
because I thought it was a complete film which had a lasting impact beyond the runtime of the film,” Abhiroop said, adding, “I shared my frustrations with Adil and he just asked to wait for the right moment and said that it will come. And well, patience is virtue indeed.”
To be able to make the final list of 121 films from 3264 is satisfying, to say the least, for the team. Meal is also in the Official Competition at the Ottawa Indian Film Festival 2019, taking place at Ottawa from June 11-15. Meal gets screened on June 12 at 8:30pm. “A big shoutout to Inderpreet Singh for having us at Ottawa this year. Wish you and your team all the best!,” said an excited Abhiroop.
The short, which is 10-minute long, revolves around a deranged family and also stars Bollywood actor Ratnabali Bhattacharjee, playing Adil’s wife, and playwright and thespian Arun Mukhopadhyay in a pivotal role. The DOP of the short is Deep Metkar — Abhiroop’s batchmate from Prague Film School — and also from Mumbai. Recently, Five Mad Men hosted an evening where the short was screened to a packed house. “I have been receiving a lot of messages on
Facebook from people wanting to watch Meal. They were getting constant updates on Facebook about the film’s selection in different international festivals and especially after a couple of brilliant international reviews. Adil was also tweeting about it and created the right kind of buzz,” Abhiroop said, adding, “So, we decided to host a small screening in Kolkata, where we would invite around 120 people. But we received messages from more than 387 people willing to watch the film which came as a pleasant surprise. On that day, in spite of a capacity for 120 people, 177 turned up. It was a full house and people just loved the live interactions with Adil and Pankaj.”
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