MUMBAI: Indian film “The Holy Fish”, directed by Vimal Chandra Pandey and Sandeep Mishra, has been selected for the 21st Religion Today Film Festival in Italy. The festival screens films that best showcase how religion affects society in modern times.
The feature film category at the festival has movies from Italy, America, Bangladesh, Canada, Russia, Turkey, South Korea, Belgium and Israel. “The Holy Fish” is the sole entry from India. Shot in Allahabad during the ‘Magh’ festival and in Manikpur village, the film features veteran theatre actor Syed Iqbal Ahmed in the central role of an old man seeking nirvana.
The film also stars National School of Drama (NSD) graduate Suman Patel, who was most recently seen opposite “Mukkabaaz” actor Vineet Singh in an advertisement for a mobile network. The story revolves around two lonely souls, an old man and newly-married woman, who travel to the Kumbh Mela chasing their dreams. The old man, after a near-death experience, wants to touch the holy fish, which is believed to lead to nirvana while the woman, whose husband has left home, tries to drown her loneliness in the Kumbh crowd.
The background score of the film is given by Rohit Sharma, who worked on Hindi film “Anaarkali of Aarah”. “We are delighted that the film has been selected for this international film festival. We hope that this will make its journey and the process of its release easier,” writer-director Pandey told PTI. “We often get confused between our needs and desires. The film attempts to show this dilemma,” he added. PTI
