This is a well-produced film with good performances by all the actors. However, the climax of Listener leaves the viewer a bit under-whelmed. This could perhaps be blamed on the format of a short film where the creator is confined by the duration. Yet there is a distinct need for the crescendo to rise in a different manner. The protagonist of the short film works at a restaurant where people pay him to listen to them talk. Listener, thus, also becomes a comment on the loneliness in society where despite friends, family and a job, people have to pay to get heard. Bottomline? It's a good film with a great concept, but there's an inexplainable sense of something being absent.

Listener | Short Film of the Day

Manorath, which translates to desire or heart's hope, is a lovely, quiet story about an overlap of urban and rural sensibilities, the fleeting moment when they seem to have reached a common plane and the swift shattering of this space. The storytelling adopted to communicate the thought is not one marked by garishness or loud devices. Instead, in the same vein as that of a soulful Rabindranath Tagore narrative, for it is indeed The Postmaster by him that serves as the inspiration for the short film, it conveys its intentions and motivations. When a photographer visits a village for a work project, he finds himself striking an unlikely friendship with a ten-year-old girl. The latter helps the former make some sense of a territory formerly unknown to him where the only pass-time available is to visit a nearby river. However, despite his sleek gadgets and experiences of a city-life, he is unable to grasp how little these things mean for a girl who only seeks friendship and affection, and not any material gains he might secure for her. The film is notably lucid in conveying the same, leaving no doubt in the viewer's mind about its core message, in the process, allowing itself to be a successful final result.

Manorath | Short Film of the Day

The film opens with a mellow scene of a grandfather teaching a child about the values that shaped and built the life he leads now in a village of Maharashtra. The story then progresses to introduce the viewer to the child’s father, Namya. 

As each character is gradually introduced, a story develops with a conflict at its heart that is becoming increasingly common in our contemporary reality. Builders from Pune want to acquire more and more agricultural land, often by pressuring and arm-twisting the local farmers, and turn the fields into buildings of cement and concrete. 

By portraying two father-son equations, of Tatya and Ganga, and Namya and his Appa, the film explores the many anxieties and tensions that define this situation. The performances remain steadfast throughout, alongside skilled visuals that bring these ideas and relationships to life. The story further ropes in drama, punctuated with a little humor every now and then, to share all of this with audiences, finally concluding with an important social message.

Varasa | Spotlight

The short film captures a moment often common to the lives of urban youth - the guest list preparation for a party. The entirety of the plot unfolds within the confines of a video call, while simultaneously giving us a glimpse into a recent experience of a similar gathering one of the two participants had attended. As the viewer is taken deeper into the evening, the film comes across as entertaining and amusing. It offers you a moment, but does not build on it. It would be a welcome prospect to see the young team take their endeavor further in the form of a longer project that involves us more in the lives of the characters and their social dynamics.

Party Residents | Short Film Nominee

The film interweaves several visuals, minus any dialogue, of a city space to suggest a narrative whose form would be determined with what the viewer chooses to take from it. From different seasons to different times of the day, from splashes of rains to dry spells, the visuals, backed by music, capture it all. However, the distance it covers in the abstract space keeps it away from a cohesion it could have instead benefited from.

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