Kolkata Calling is a coming-of-age film about today’s youth who don’t want to fit into society’s conventional idea of what it means to be “successful”. These Young Turks dare to dream the impossible dream of wishing that they could just be left alone and allowed to just be happy. The looks of the characters of Kolkata Calling are based on tributes to select characters and people from cinema and real life who have struck a chord with me. Some people say art imitates life. In my case, art imitates life — imitates art. My cinematic inspirations range widely from the works of Mrinal Sen and the blockbusters of Hollywood to the diasporic cinema of filmmakers like Mira Nair. The characters and their looks in Kolkata Calling reflect these images from some of my favourite movies.

KRITTIKA’S MOTHER

(Moon Moon Sen): Krittika’s mother’s look is a tribute to Barbra Streisand’s role as Rozalin Focker in Meet the Fockers (sequel to Meet the Parents), where she plays an unconventional larger-than-life mom. Krittika’s mother, though, has darker shades.