BFI London Film Festival: Azmaish: A Journey Through The Subcontinent

BFI Film Festival: 243 features. 67 countries. 15 cinemas. 12 days. One Festival.

Pakistani director Sabiha Sumar and Indian actor Kalki Koechlin traverse their countries to examine a radically changing political landscape and the rise of intolerance. Sabiha Sumar returns to the LFF with an incisive and personal search for the future of her country, wondering how she herself fits into that society.

She questions the genesis of Pakistan, soon delving into her ancestral roots in India. Accompanying her, Kalki Koechlin engages in a discussion that encompasses contemporary life: soon the conversations between the two women and their encounters with political figures and ordinary people gives rise to a personal and poetic search to uncover the voices of the silent majority, particularly those of women.

This film reveals new perspectives on the possibility of peace between the two neighbours divided by an imposed partition. But as Sumar argues, it also shows the countries travelling on a similar path of religious extremism.

(Notes by Cary Rajinder Sawhney)

Azmaish: A Journey Through the Subcontinent, dir Sabiha Sumar, Pakistan 2017, 85 mins

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