Three years after the release of Kahaani , filmmaker Sujoy Ghosh weaves in elements of mystery in a 14-minute, 9-second thriller short Ahalya . Starring Soumitra Chatterjee, Radhika Apte and Tota Roy Chowdhury, Ahalya was unveiled on YouTube on Monday evening and since then, the positive responses have been pouring in. A pleased Sujoy Ghosh says, “It’s just a short film, and I didn’t expect people to react with so much warmth.”
Kahaani unfolded against the Durga puja in Kolkata, and this film, also set in Kolkata, draws from the story of Ahalya from Ramayana. “There are tons and tons of material to explore from Ramayana and Mahabharata, all of which are socially, politically and morally relevant to us. I am a god-believing person and I like to look into mythology,” he says.
In Sujoy’s modern-day take on Ahalya, Soumitra Chatterjee is Goutam Sadhu (stands for Gautama maharishi from the epic), the bewitching Radhika Apte is Ahalya and Tota Roy Chowdhury is inspector Indran Sen (Indra from the epic). Unlike the cursed Ahalya who turned into a stone and waited for deliverance, Sujoy’s story has an eerie twist. “The Ahalya story intrigued me for a long time. I felt it’s unfair on the woman. I wanted this film to depict greed, lust and power that’s crept into society,” he says.
Sujoy feels a short film should invoke a reaction in viewers, make them ask questions and lead to a discussion. “We don’t have too many windows of discussion and a short film should serve the purpose,” he says. Soumitra Chatterjee was his first choice to play the male lead. “It was my dream to work with him and for this role I wanted no one else,” says Sujoy.
Royal Stag had approached Sujoy to make this ‘large short film’ a while ago. Sujoy took a week to write a 10-page script. The shooting was done in two days in Kolkata. “Writing and shooting a short film requires the discipline of a feature film. You don’t have the luxury of time because of the smaller budget,” he adds.
Post Kahaani , Sujoy portrayed the part of Byomkesh Bakshi in Rituparno Ghosh’s Bengali film Satyanweshi . In the meantime, there have been talks of a sequel to Kahaani . “I’ll make the sequel when the script is ready. I’ve been talking a lot and doing little. Maybe I should do the reverse now,” he quips.
