Ek Tha Gaon (Once Upon a Village)

My friendship with Leela Devi began during one visit to my own ancestral village. Her resilience in loneliness and dynamic personality drew me towards her. As she worked in the light and shadow of her kitchen, I saw a film emerge. With this as an anchorage, I set out to understand other experiences in the village.

In contrast to Leela, Golu occupies a quiet space in the film. In the hesitant silences between her sentences, she communicated to me the impracticality of her life in this village.

The film style re-creates the pace of the village and its residents. Life here is slow and quiet. This ethos is represented in wide frames and long, staying visuals. By focusing on the environment as a strong element, the film aims to break out of a human-centric telling of the story of migration.

It captures movement, destruction, and circularity taking place in nature – forest fire and mountain blasting and, on a philosophical note, a female flying ant shedding her wings to start a new colony.