Aniruddha and Rahul Bose at the MIAAC Indian Film Festival

Festival audience to university auditoriums, Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury (better known as Tony) tells t2 how Antaheen bridged borders in the US...

I was in the US to attend the MIAAC Indian Film Festival (Mahindra Indo-American Arts Council New York’s Indian Film Festival) in New York from November 15, where my film Antaheen was being shown. We had two screenings — the first at New York’s prestigious Walter Reade Theatre and the second at Quad Cinema.

Of the Antaheen team, Rahul (Bose) had accompanied me from India, while Kalyanda (Ray) and Shauvik joined us there. At the MIAAC, I met Mira Nair, Shyam Benegal, Anurag Kashyap and Sudhir Mishra. Suman Mukhopadhyay was there with his Chaturanga.

With Kalyan Ray and a friend after lunch at the roadside Bengali restaurant they found in New York

There were question-answer sessions after the screenings, which were very enriching. A lot of people liked the music of Antaheen. The best thing is that they could connect to the film... they could relate to the loneliness of the characters. The festival has broadened my horizon as a filmmaker. There was a healthy exchange of ideas among the directors, most of them so renowned. I interacted with them at the post-screening party.

Wrapping up the festival chapter, we drove down to Yale University to show Antaheen to the faculty and the students. It was an initiative of Kalyanda and there, too, the response was overwhelming! There was a Q&A with the faculty and students over breakfast after the screening. Rahul was also present. I was surprised when a student said he had seen Anuranan!

Our next stop was Boston’s MIT College where we showed the film and chatted with the students and faculty members.

There’s a huge market for our films in New Jersey, where a lot of Indians live. There is an international audience for original Bangla films, which we must tap soon. I met a few distributors who are trying to tap the North American market.

Another high of this 11-day trip was finding a roadside restaurant that served up some great Bengali food. For lunch we would have Beguni, Mushur Dal, Pabdar Jhaal and Rui Machher Kalia with a dash of lime!