India's first Palme d'Or contender in 30 yrs emerges as frontrunner

One of the final few main Competition titles to premiere at the 77th Cannes Film Festival, Payal Kapadia's "All We Imagine as Light" has instantly emerged as a frontrunner for the Palme d'Or. No Indian female director has ever competed for Cannes' top prize nor has any filmmaker from the country bagged the coveted award.Kapadia, flanked by her four principal actors, Kani Kusruti, Divya Prabha, Hridhu Haroon and Chhaya Kadam, cinematographer Ranabir Das and producers Thomas Hakim of Petit Chaos and Zico Maitra of Chalk and Cheese, addressed critics at the festival’s press conference hall on Friday morning.

Luminous Red Steps Montée des Marches lumineuse
ALL WE IMAGINE AS LIGHT – PAYAL KAPADIA

Avec l’équipe du film / With the film crew

Chhaya Kadam, Hridhu Haroon, Kani Kusruti, Payal Kapadia, Divya Prabha, Ranabir Das, Julien Graff, Zico Maitra, Thomas Hakim#Cannes2024… pic.twitter.com/upZGnVqEPe

— Festival de Cannes (@Festival_Cannes) May 23, 2024

Critics have heaped unstinted press on the film. BBC described "All We Imagine as Light" as “universal and emotional enough to hypnotise anyone who has been alone in a city, or been spellbound by a film on the subject.” “Just two films into her young career, Kapadia has established her rare talent for finding passages of exquisite poetry within the banal blank verse of everyday India life,” wrote Variety’s Jessica Kiang.

Lights, Camera, follow the Red Steps!

ALL WE IMAGINE AS LIGHT – PAYAL KAPADIA#Cannes2024 #Competition #OfficialSelection https://t.co/4JD1qcoulG

— Festival de Cannes (@Festival_Cannes) May 23, 2024

But truth be told, "All We Imagine as Light" is a true-blue original, a remarkably individualistic film that has sprung from the mind and heart of a writer-director who astutely and spontaneously blends her innate humanism with phenomenal grasp of control over craft.The title is also about hope," Kapadia said at the press meet. "When things are looking a bit bleak sometimes and you don't know whether there is a way out, you imagine that there might be a light somewhere down the line.