Already a winner at Sundance and Cannes,All That Breatheshas earned Sen his first Oscar nomination.
DEADLINE: What has the journey been like for you from Sundance 2022 to now?
My girlfriend said the other day that, apparently, my favorite word these days is discombobulated.
John Phillips/Getty Images
And I said, Theres clearly a reason for it.
Its not like a simple-minded Whoa, wonderful!
Watch on Deadline
DEADLINE: Take me back to the origins of the film.
From left, Salik Rehman, Nadeem Shehzad, Director Shaunak Sen and Mohammad Saud at the Cannes photocall forAll That Breathes.Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images
Did it start with seeing the birds dropping from the sky?
In Delhi, everybodys preoccupied with the air and the almost sentient creepiness that its accrued in recent years.
I started with this interest in the air and an interest in human/ non-human entanglement, philosophically speaking.
So, initially, theres this kind of a conceptual force field that youre animated by.
Its really about then blending those two things together, and thats how the film began.
DEADLINE: Do you have a sense of how the film has impacted Nadeem, Saud and Salik?
SEN: I think on multiple registers.
For one, theyve been traveling a lot.
Nadeem, Saud and Salik came to Cannes.
So, its a crazy time.
Theres more media attention on their [rehabilitation] work than there ever has been.
So, theres some degree of material alleviation.
All I hope for is some kind of an oasis.
Thats what were hoping for.
Obviously, that increases the audience significantly.
SEN: Oh, 100 percent.
Im constantly getting tagged on social media, so thats usually my only index to figure things out.
Im now in a perpetual state of mild surprise.
Its not a diminishing graph at all.
I also personally and selfishly feel happy every time somebody uses the word cinematic.
DEADLINE: That it is.
Then we see the reflection of an airplane move over it.
But more than anything else, so often, what we call beauty is a function of time.
Because if you keep turning up and shooting, at some point, life rewards you with accidents.
So much of the documentary is a kind of a radical embrace of the un-scriptedness of the world.
I think a large part of what you are describing as beautiful is really a function of time.
DEADLINE: Im wondering what your familys reaction has been to the extraordinary embrace of your film.
SEN: My father passed away very suddenly in the middle of the film.
That actually, I believe, gave the film a kind of elegiac, somber quality.
DEADLINE: Why do you say grudging recognition of it?
SEN: No, my parents were always incredibly supportive of whatever I wanted to do.
And everything Ive done is because theyve formed a subsurface of my life.
Even if you had a lot of confidence in your childs ability, youd be a bit skeptical.
DEADLINE: Thats fair.
Youve noted previously that while shooting the film, you kept a respectful distance from the black kites.
It wasnt like you said, Let me pet the bird, or that sort of thing.
I imagine you havent spent much time with birds in the past year because of your travels.
SEN: I mean, theyre not the kind of cute songbirds that elicit petting.
Youd have to be an atypical individual to just randomly go up to a black kite and pet it.
It immediately opened familiar rabbit holes from the past where I kept watching it.
Because, clearly, it wouldve eaten for the day.
Its the last bit of the day for it and so on.
And theyre able to keep a tab on it.
So just that kind of stuff.
Which is all to say that the birds havent receded from my mind at all.
DEADLINE: India, of course, has a huge cinematic tradition.
But from what the social media ether tells me, there is that.
Theres some degree of restlessness to see the film.
But yeah, I dont spend too much time thinking about the intricacies of pride or not.
DEADLINE: Are you feeling ready to attend the Academy Awards next month?
Do you know what youre going to wear for example?
SEN: I emphatically do not, and I will defer that decision.
