Reunion is a story of closure, obtained years after separation. This short film by Google is very well directed and crafted, especially how it captures the power of Google Search in daily life. The actors are good, as is the wonderful background track by Piyush Mishra, Bachpane ki tang gali. Go visit your childhood.

Reunion | Short Film of the Day

Winner, Gender Award

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Every minute, over two dozen people are forced to flee their home. Out of every two refugees, one is a child. Let that sink in and be a reminder of the hatred that is ravaging this world from all corners. The short film deals with the extent of the fear for one's security and the desperate need to find shelter when someone is forced out of their own home. Visa is a beautifully written film about a inter-communal couple in Pakistan and their trauma of trying to leave the country with their young daughter. It follows a non-linear narrative and succeeds greatly at creating a heightened atmosphere of uncertainty. It also invokes a disturbing reality, a sense of despair, but concludes with a bleak sense of hope for the optimistic viewer.

Visa | Short Film of the Day

When Teeli and Arre get together to make a film about India and Pakistan, it's a pity if you still miss it. In the age of Tinder and start-ups and women choosing careers over settling down, this short film is bound to strike a chord with so many millennials on both sides of the Wagah border. The strength of Matched lies in the fact that it highlights the homogeneity of the two cultures - how young people struggle with the same generation gap everywhere, while at the same time managing to highlight their uniqueness. The script is simple, yet the portrayal, meticulously carried out by two separate crews in India and Pakistan, often over video calls and other media of the Internet, is heartwarming and beautiful.

Matched | Short Film of the Day

Some of the most beautiful stories are the saddest and the short film goes ahead to prove that. School Bag, as the name suggests, revolves around one inane object that a seven-year-old child dearly desires as a birthday gift. Of course his loving mother would try to ensure that he is the happiest boy on his birthday. However, at the heart of this unadulterated happiness, lies a deeply moving tragedy. Based on true events, the Peshawar school massacre that took place on 16th December 2014, the short film touches the right chord with the viewer without even remotely falling prey to sentimentalism. One of the major reasons for this is the effortlessly convincing performance by Rasika Dugal as a young mother, busying herself for her son's birthday preparations. The film also portrays that the victims of mindless violence and terrorism are not simply confined to a community, nationality or age group, and that pain cuts the same gash universally.

The School Bag | Short Film of the Day

On a war front, or in the case of borders of two adjacent countries like India and Pakistan, an overarching factor that makes its presence felt is homogeneity. The same is true for the narrative of this film. They may have different names, but essentially, the soldiers and their ideologies often overlap. Line Of Duty engages with the aforementioned thought, while also going further to explore the dynamics of the army men of two opposing countries in its own nuanced manner. The story is of a single afternoon when ideas of right and wrong, morality, courage and everything the soldiers have been trained for so far are put to question. When a natural disaster strikes the two camps, would it differentiate between their nationalities, and more importantly, would the personnel and officers find themselves united in their tragedy or would ideas of nationalism continue to divide them? The film is intelligent in its exploration of these complexities and offers strong performances and camerawork to delineate the same.

Line Of Duty | Short Film Nominee

The way to someone's heart is through their stomach - this saying is echoed beautifully in this short film by Shan foods - Khaana With Parosi. It shares the story of a Chinese housewife in Pakistan, who befriends the locals in a unique way.

#KhaanaWithParosi | Short Film of the Day

'What got into us back then', laments one of the characters of Dhund, looking back at the Partition eleven years later. Much like other Shlok Sharma films, this one too questions the pointlessness of communal conflict and the ugly sides of the human nature it reveals. The short film by Sudeep Kanwal starts on a high and maintains the poignancy all through it's first half. However, in the second half, it dips to not recover again. Had the film been shorter and tauter, perhaps it would have sustained the depth it had set its horizon of expectation for. Despite its flaws, Dhund will leave you with a moving glimpse of a conflict that destroyed many lives, irrespective of the side of the border.

Dhund | Short Film of the Day

Ahead of Father’s Day, Blush’ latest offering is about a nervous, newly married’s woman’s relationship with her father-in-law. The narrative is plotted against the background of an India-Pakistan cricket match. As they watch the match together, the memory of the 1996 World Cup, where India and Pakistan played in the same team against Sri Lanka, is invoked. While reminding the viewer of a heartwarming memory in the history of the World Cup, the young woman finds a similar emotional space with her father-in-law that she had once found wit her own father. Released amidst the World Cup hysteria that has gripped the nation, the short film is simple, endearing and makes for a wholesome watch.

Unexpected Partnership | Short Film of the Day

Locating itself during a very pivotal moment in history, the 1947 partition of India, the short film introduces the viewer to the social milieu of the time. Using the same as the hinterland against which the narrative unfolds, the film allows its concerns to achieve a more localised, personal and intimate approach. 

 While at first glance the period drama might seem like the story of the communal tensions and the absolute chaos that ravaged the towns that were close to the soon to be mapped out India-Pakistan border, it is much more than that. It is after this realisation that the film becomes the story of an eccentric and temperamental writer who introduces us to his own stories through the dilemmas and conflicts of the characters in his mind. Their visual representation allows almost an other-worldly, surreal quality to the film. 

 As stories of entire cultures get rewritten by history, portrayed by a film whose title, Ardhviram, or semicolon, is a direct echo of something that does not denote completion in itself, where will the protagonist find himself with respect to the thoughts and experiences that consume him, as well as his personal struggles as a writer?

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