GUWAHATI: Bridge, an Assamese film depicting the struggles of people against floods in Assam, won the special mention award at the 51st International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in Goa on Sunday.
Directed by Guwahati-based filmmaker Kripal Kalita, Bridge is the first Assamese film to bag an award in the international competition of IFFI.
Twenty-four years back, Adajya, an Assamese film directed by Santwana Bardoloi, had received the jury award in the Asian category of the festival.
Shot on location at Sonarichapori in Upper Assam’s Dhakuakhana, Kalita’s movie depicts the struggle of a teenage girl residing along the bank of a tributary of the Brahmaputra in the absence of a bridge and amid perennial floods.
“Every year during monsoon, villages and farmlands are submerged by the rising water of the Brahmaputra and its tributaries, causing immense hardships to people in Assam. In the film, I tried to portray the struggles of a teenage girl, Jonaki in her flood-hit village with the lack of a bridge over the river compounding her woes. Be it the loss of her father in the deluge, the difficulties faced by her brother to attend school or the challenges in her own life, Jonaki has been depicted as a strong young woman coping with life amid adversity,” Kalita told The Shillong Times on Monday.
“Having brought up in a flood-affected area, I wanted to express the problem through a movie. I grew up in Tamulpur (Baksa district) and have seen and experienced how floods affect people every year. Poor connectivity in the absence of basic amenities such as bridges keeps villagers disconnected from the mainland besides depriving children of proper education and patients of healthcare,” he said.
An independent filmmaker with a theatre background, Kalita started shooting the film in May 2018 with an all new cast and crew.
He completed the movie, made with a limited budget of Rs 32 lakh, in February 2020, just before the COVID-triggered lockdown in Assam.
About the cast, the 43-year-old filmmaker said had to do a lot of research to locate the movie’s protagonist, Jonaki.
“I did not want to take regular actors. So I visited villages and did screen tests on about 300 girls before finally spotting the right girl to play the role of Jonaki,” he said.
As of now, entries have been sent across 16 film festivals across the world.
Despite demands and pleas over the decades, Assam floods are yet to be declared a national problem.
“So I wanted to highlight this burning issue of Assam through the film. As it is, the issue hardly finds the space it deserves in the national media. But I am optimistic that Assam’s floods would be declared a national problem and a solution found one day,” Kalita said.