The film lacked both a major U.S. distributor and streaming partner.
A billion people sort of erupted in joy because were a film-loving nation.
There has been a steady momentum of reckoning about who is telling whose stories.
‘All That Breathes,’ ‘Writing with Fire,’ ‘The Elephant Whisperers’ and ‘A Night of Knowing Nothing’Sideshow/Submarine Deluxe/HBO Documentary/Music Box Films/ Netflix /The Cinema Guild
Financially, this has strengthened the muscle needed to support the strength of our vision.
Writing with Firepremiered in 2021 at one of those globally revered festivals Sundance.
Sen attests to a noticeable change in international attention and recognition for Indian documentaries and filmmakers.
‘Writing With Fire’ Directors Sushmit Ghosh (left) and Rintu ThomasBlack Ticket Films
Sen identifies several factors that have contributed to the growing prominence of Indian documentary filmmaking.
Technological factors have helped DSLRs made things easier, and you were not as dependent.
Now it’s possible for you to shoot 4K for cheaper.
I think now is when a lot of things have come to fructify.
TheAll That Breathesdirector credits Indian documentary filmmakers in the previous decade with laying a strong foundation for progress.
Sen is not the only Indian documentary director this year to land a spot on the highly-competitive Oscar shortlists.
So did Kartiki Gonsalves, in the doc shorts category, with her Netflix filmThe Elephant Whisperers.
I have noticed that getting documentaries [onto a streaming platform] is challenging, Gonsalves tells Deadline.
They always have this question Will it be successful?
I said I needed a producer so I could focus on the creative.
Guneet brought in [EP-editor] Douglas Blush because she had previously worked with him onPeriod.
After that, we worked nonstop for three years, and here we are today.
All ThatBreathes Sen agrees that the rise of streamers has made a huge difference for documentary filmmakers generally.
The coming in of the OTT has amplified a kind of appetite for nonfiction globally, he says.
He points to additional factors that have boosted Indian doc filmmaking.
Getting into top-tier film festivals like Sundance really alters the coordinates of the life of the film.
This was the game-changer for us.
India has long proven an alluring subject for Western documentary filmmakers.
Pioneering Canadian filmmaker James Beveridge earned acclaim for his 1957 filmHimalayan Tapestry: The Craftsmen of Kashmir.
British filmmaker Michael Wood examined the subcontinents history in the 2007 documentary seriesThe Story of India.
Whats different now is that Indian filmmakers are doing the storytelling.
I studied film direction at the Film and Television Institute of India.
I didnt intend to be a documentary filmmaker.
I just wanted to make films!
Sen sees certain tropes present in stories about India made by Western filmmakers.
Its always about issues of surface-level disenfranchisement or disempowerment, which at times feels a bit cardboard and thin.
If its here [India] its about poverty.
And that happens when you are intimately immersed in the vernacular and colloquial cultures of the place.
Gonsalves ofThe Elephant Whisperersfeels the lens becomes more precise through the eyes of a native.
Im interested in giving voice to those who havent been heard.
In India, til now, there is still a heavy burden on colonialism.
Foreigners still tend to look down on Indians as people who have been subjected to their rule.
You must tell a story from the heart and strike an emotional chord.
You could be an outsider within your own city in different neighborhoods.
