A date with death

The theatre is almost full. As the credits roll at the end of screening, most in the audience are crying. For a documentary, that is no mean achievement. ‘A Fly on the Wall’ by Nilesh Maniyar and Shonali Bose is based on the physician-assisted suicide of Bose’s longtime friend, Chika Kapadia.

Diagnosed with a rare terminal cancer in 2022, Kapadia opted for assisted death in Zurich, Switzerland, and asked Bose to film what he called his “going away party”, until his last breath. The 82-minute documentary that premiered at the 29th Busan International Film Festival last year, was recently screened at the Cinevesture International Film Festival in Chandigarh.

This is the fourth collaboration between Maniyar and Bose after ‘Margarita with a Straw’ (2014), ‘The Sky is Pink’ (2019) and ‘Raat Rani’ (‘Modern Love Mumbai’).

At the Q and A after the screening, people open up about their fears and anxieties. A woman speaks about the loss of a friend and how she has never spoken about it till now. “This has happened wherever ‘A Fly on the Wall’ has been screened. It has opened up conversations about death, as people cry but also get at ease with this final loss,” says Bose.

The documentary, an exploration and introspection on death, has some hard-hitting moments where one questions the idea of mortality. “Across screenings in India and abroad, many young people said the film helped them understand and get past the fear of death,” shares the duo.

The matter-of-fact film also captures the complexities of friendship between Bose and Kapadia quite honestly. It portrays Bose’s dilemma, who is supposed to be a mere observer — a fly on the wall in the documentary — between filming the moments that will enhance the film’s emotional quotient and being a friend to Kapadia in his last days. “Nilesh came to my rescue in finding this balance during such critical moments,” says the writer-director, who also speaks about her personal loss in this film, the death of her 16-year-old son Ishan in an accident in 2010.

Often called the ‘dream team’, both Bose and Maniyar had an interesting start in the film industry. Bose had gone to the US for her PhD in history but ended up learning filmmaking, while Maniyar was in Pune to study engineering but started helping friends at the Film and Television Institute of India on their diploma films, eventually landing in Mumbai.

“I was casting for her film ‘Chittagong’ (2012). On the sets, we would often share stories with strong female protagonists. That’s how the partnership started,” recalls Maniyar.

And that has remained the core of all their projects. The duo’s latest web series, ‘Ziddi Girls’, is about college girls who find and raise their voice against a strict principal and shape their future as change-makers.

Despite having strong women characters in all her films, Bose hates to be dubbed as a ‘woman director’. “Why should one’s gender matter? It is like saying a male director can’t make a feminist film. ‘Raat Rani’ was a strong feminist story. Nilesh wrote it,” says Bose.

Muniyar nods in agreement. “Do we ever say male director? Direction is a craft, patriarchy is an ideology. Of course, there is a long road ahead to attain gender parity. Men need to be included in this conversation. It is a mistake to alienate them. The more these conversations remain boxed, the longer the path will be,” he feels.

In the past, their films have dealt with themes of death and illness and were inspired by real-life stories. ‘Margarita…’ was based on a cousin of Bose. ‘The Sky is Pink’ was based on author and motivational speaker Aisha Chaudhary’s life. Maniyar had also made a documentary, ‘Black Sunshine Baby’, on Chaudhary.

“It was never intentional,” smiles Bose. Maniyar is working on a web series as well as his first independent feature film. Bose, too, is excited about an indie feature, crowd-funded like ‘Amu’, “so that one can have complete political and creative freedom”.

20 years of ‘Amu’

I was 18, studying in Miranda House, Delhi, when the 1984 genocide happened. We were locked inside the hostel for three days. After the curfew, our college took a radical decision to take the interested history students to the riot-affected areas of Tirlokpuri, Mangolpuri, Sultanpuri. It was shocking to see the devastation, hear stories, hold sobbing women in my arms who had seen their husbands, fathers, sons burnt alive in front of their eyes. They spoke about recognising kale chashme wale politicians who paid mobs and marked the Sikh houses through electoral rolls. But the newspapers gave a different version, calling it Hindu-Sikh riots. After I graduated from the film school in New York in 1997, I felt compelled to tell this story and based my first film, ‘Amu’, on the genocide.

While shooting, we kept the subject under wraps and kept the riots’ sequence for the last, but even then I got threats and we had to finish the shoot in one day. The censor board also directed us to cut some dialogues. I just removed the sound but kept the scene where the women are being asked about who are the culprits. Despite so many challenges, it won the National Award.

All non-Punjabi, non-Sikh audiences said it opened their eyes and minds. At the Berlin film festival, where it had German subtitles, ‘Amu’ received a four-minute standing ovation. But I feel the film has not got its due, especially in Punjab. On ‘Amu’s’ 20th anniversary, I wish the film is re-released in Punjab. I will give it for free. — Shonali Bose

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