Of Pride and no prejudice

Organisers, jury members bring the rainbow into the room at the press meet on Wednesday. Pic/Anurag Ahire

Putting some cool into the midst of a brutal Mumbai summer, Kashish, the city's premier Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer (LGBTQ) film festival organisers held a conference at the Press Club at Azad Maidan, South Mumbai on Wednesday afternoon. Kashish will be held from May 15 to 19 at Liberty Cinema (Marine Lines), Alliance Française de Bombay (Marine Lines); and Cinepolis (Andheri West). Kashish turns 15 this year, but instead of a tempestuous, trying teen, the film festival's offerings have shown nuance and maturity, said the jury of different categories.

Mental health

Festival director Shridhar Rangayan said, "From this year, Kashish has been named Kashish Pride Film Festival. Earlier it was Kashish Queer Film Festival. The pride word denotes more inclusivity, with the fest including allies, sponsors, supporters… everyone." Saagar Gupta, director of programming, said, "There are 133 films from 46 countries. We have a new award category too, the Keshav Suri Foundation supported the award for the best Indian film on mental health."

The jury gave some impactful insights. Arunaraje Patil, a long-serving jury member said, "I came in as a jury member of Kashish. Today, this has become a family. Life and cinema are so closely related. After all, what are movies? They are about life. When you watch movies, you connect with characters, you put away judgment." Dolly Thakore on the panel hilariously recalled that she was a film reviewer when Deepa Mehta's ‘Fire', a film about a lesbian relationship was released. Thakore said, "I remember I was at the New Empire cinema then. I was picked up by the police, put in a van and taken to the police station. I told the police, what are you doing, I have a show to compère at a South Mumbai venue in the evening. They told me: "Do not worry madam, we will let you off soon." The jury's Vivek Vaswani said he did not see Kashish as cinema but, "About a community finding its voice. Kashish is that voice."

Powerful, poignant

There was the festival's narrative jury, with actor Sonali Kulkarni as part of the panel. Kulkarni said, "I started my career playing a non-gender character. I played a tree in a film. I have seen these films as a jury member and have been blown away by how mature they were with their powerful storylines. The movies were courageous. The rainbow (symbol of diversity used by LGBTQ) has touched me a little." Kiran Rao stressed that watching the films brought home the message of, "A shared humanity. The layered, unusual stories spoke of how we all connected. I have always felt an ally of the community," she said.

Impressive array

The documentary jury present at the conference, Shilpi Gulati and Kavita Bahl and student jury members, Abhijit Mazumdar and Shweta Basu Prasad spoke about personal memories like watching queer films clandestinely to being a jury at an open, flourishing, well-known film fest as an indicator of how far we have come. They referenced brave documentaries in the Kashish bouquet, which are first-person narratives. "It is not always easy to tell your story, it is easy to tell the other person's story," a member observed. The student jury spoke about, "Seeing movies with completely nuanced, professional storytelling." The jury panels spoke in one voice as they said they could not wait for Mumbai to experience the movies they had.