OTTAWA PREMIERE
Director: Sanal Kumar Sasidharan
India | 2022 | 93 min | drama | Malayalam, with English subtitles
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The Quarrel (Vazhakku) tells the story of a man on the run. On the day he agreed to appear in court to sign a mutual divorce, Siddharthan, who is also a lawyer, cheats on his wife Lakshmi and goes on an inland drive. He urges Lakshmi over the phone to postpone the divorce, citing their daughter Tara’s future, but the attempt fails. On the way back, he meets Sathi and her mute daughter who were leaving home due to marital problems. This meeting changes his outlook on life.
Born in Kerala in 1977, SANAL KUMAR SASIDHARAN started as a lawyer, but in 2001, his love of cinema led him to form the Kazhcha Film Forum, dedicated to making independent movies through crowdfunding. After three shorts (Athisayalokam, Parole and Frog), he started delving into feature filmmaking, with a strand of award-winning films, including Six Feet High (2014) and An Off-Day Game (2015), both winners of the FIPRESCI Award at the Festival of Kerala; the unscripted marvel Sexy Durga (2017), winner of the Hivos Tiger Award at the International Film Festival Rotterdam; Shadow of Water (2019), which competed in Venice; and A’hr (2020), nominated for the Kim Jiseok Award at the Busan International Film Festival. His latest film, The Quarrel (Vazhakku), is based on his own personal observations about marital strife and the inherent violence of human hegemony over nature. “In the village in which I was born and raised, marital strife was common”, he says. “I have always noticed that the tensions it creates are reflected not only in gender relations but also in the ecosystem and depths of violence that pervades society as a whole. One of the most important things that struck me regarding this was the anxiety about the future of children, the mute spectators of this violence, growing up in a state of unrest. […] This film is the sum total of my thoughts on the subject.”
scr.: Sanal Kumar Sasidharan | cin.: Selvaraj Chandru | ed.: Sanal Kumar Sasidharan | cost.: Vaisak Ravi | art dir.: Rajasekharan Marthandam | snd: Sanal Kumar Sasidharan | mus.: Prithvi Chandrasekhar | cast: Tovino Thomas, Kani Kusruti, Azees Nedumangad, Sudev Nair, Byju Netto | prod.: Tovino Thomas, Girish Nair, Faizal Shajin Hassan
Free parking during the screening.
$15 per ticket, plus H.S.T. ($1.95) & service fees.
