TORONTO: With her Priyanka Chopra-starrer The Sky is Pink, Shonali Bose has become the first Indian female director to score a hat-trick of films premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).
The Sky is Pink is also the only Asian film in the gala presentations at the world’s premier film festival this year.
The film will be released worldwide on October 19, including 1,000 theatres in India.
Brilliantly put in cinematic context, the film is the poignant story of Delhi’s Chaudhury couple – Aditi (played by Priyanka) and Niren (played by Farhan Akhtar) – who make every sacrifice to prolong the life of their terminally ill daughter Aisha (played by Zaira Wasim), spending all their life savings, and moving to London and seeking help from the Indian expatriate community in the UK (which raised over 200,000 pounds for them).
But for director Shonali, the film has deeper personal meanings as she too lost her young son a few years ago, followed by the end of her marriage.
She said what fascinated her about the story of the Chaudhury couple was that despite their tragedy, their relationship endured.
“Yes, this film is very much autobiographical for me in the sense that it is not the events of my life or my son, as the events of the Chaudhurys’ life, but all the emotions are from my life, my feelings, my son’s death,’’ said Shonali, who is in Toronto for the film’s gala presentation on September 13.
“By the time I started writing the script of this film, I was at a place of extreme peace with my son’s death. I was not at a place of hurt or wound or mourning. Yes, it is very much about my feelings in the film.’’
She said this film also has a cathartic effect on Priyanka Chopra.
“Priyanka said that the story of the film was very cathartic for her because she had not learnt to heal from her father’s death in June 2013. Priyanka was very close to her father. So it (filming of this movie) was very healing for her emotionally,’’ added Shonali.
How did she come to know about the story of the Chaudhury family?
“In January 2015, Amir Khan released a trailer of my film Margarita, With a Straw with his film PK. The girl Aisha was 18 at that time. She watched the trailer of my film 30 times and told her parents that she wanted to live to see the movie. But five years ago, this girl had been told by her doctors that she had only five years to live, and she was coming to the end of that five-year period. Two weeks later, Aisha died. So her wish to see my film couldn’t be fulfilled as Margarita, With a Straw was released only in April 2015,’’ narrated Shonali.
When her parents saw the film after Aisha’s death, they found that it was dedicated to the director’s son. They contacted Shonali about their tragic story and later met her in Delhi.
“That’s how it started. When I heard the story from Aisha’s parents, I told them that if I make a film, it will be about the two of you, not Aisha. I told them I am interested only in the love story of two of you – your relationship and how it survived the loss of a child,’’ said Shonali.
About casting Priyanka, she said when they sent the script to Priyanka she read it at one go at night and loved it. “I was in LA. The next morning I got a text from her secretary to say that I must fly to New York to meet Priyanka. I met her and she said `yes’ to the film.’’
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